





<* *f J 



^ ^'::j^-^% v>\^-. ^>'-^^ o^\-v 



''^- 



^0 N ^ .#' 

v^ ^ ^ '^ " . 









>' \ 









\ 









^ 



I. 



.^<^ 



/■ -Of 



*^/'sUv.-'\ ^ 






.5 VI 



0^ ,^ .c.^ 



^ i> « ^ 



xO°<, 










-^-v 



.*^' 






""oo 



A 






> N* 



^-^ --=<, 



\' 



"^' 4^ 



\ 



% V 



cf> .s;x 



■%)i^j/.j^" 






'5-' 






0^ 









'h. 



■} \ ,0 









cP' 












> 



8 1^ ^S. 









V ^r^^ ' 



^' 






% S^'- 



^.- 









-; "^^ -J. 



^ %<:. 






/ . .s s ^ .\ > . , „ O^^ 'o ., V - ^' 












' ,-^ 



0^ y:^:^/^ 



■■^ 






v^^ '^^^ 



OO^ 



,0' 



^^' 



K^' 






% .<^^' -^'^^^/'^^ '■= 






./>.V 



^. 



^ ''^ ^ ^ o 









o. 



,•0^ 









o. 



cP^ 



,'?>- 



o> 



o 0' 






^^. 



'^^. .^\^^' 



, V »■- o 






s » <> / . '^. v N i.> ^y „ \ <' 



t. N/V. a\^' */ 



^^.^ 



,0- 












'% ^'^^ 






^/. ' , .. ^ 



u '^' '. 












^*^ s-"' 



■^.^ 



c 



-0^ 



G 



\ 









^^' 






•^ 

"^^ 



\j^C^MJ^<L^r\^ 



Sir Ro^er de Coverley. 



BY THE SPECTATOR. 




BOSTON: 
TICKNOR, REED, AND FIJELDS 

MDCCCLII. 






?i>^ 






B?i..<i-M "<^ ' < 



THURSTON, TORRY, AXD EiTERSON, PRIXTEUS. 



ADVERTISEMENT. 

rPHE aim of the Spectator, as defined by Dr. Johnson, 
-*- was ' to teach the minuter decencies and inferior 
duties ; to regulate the practice of daily conversation ; 
to correct those depravities which are rather ridiculous 
than criminal, and remove those grievances which, if 
they produce no lasting calamities, impress hourly 
vexation.' The machinery adopted by the Spectator 
to accomplish this object — to soften the harshness of 
his censures, to disarm the sharpest strictures of the 
smallest offence — was a club ; the members of which, 
after the grave, taciturn, ubiquitous, keen, but kindly, 

r 

Spectator himself, were representatives of the various 
classes of society whose faults and absurdities rendered 
them most in need of pertinent admonition. To the 
coarse, intemperate, ignorant, and arrogant country 
esquires of that day, the gentle Mentor spoke through 
Sir Roger de Coverley : no model magistrate, or 
self-righteous censor; but a hearty, humorous, plain 
old gentleman — one of themselves — with enough of 



VI ADVERTISEMENT. 

their foibles, tastes, and prejudices to win their sym- 
pathies and to charm them into reformation. 

None of the characters were elaborated with so 
much care — to none was imparted such thorough 
completeness, as that of Sir Roger de Coverlet ; 
between which (to quote a saying of Horace Walpole) 
and Sir John FalstafF — though a wide interval — 

r 

nothing like it exists in literature for truthfulness and 
finish. Sir Roger's eccentricities do not, as some 
have written, disturb the consistency of the character : 
on the contrary they strengthen its individuality. If 
they be discords, instead of jarring, they enrich the 
harmony. They are precisely the humours of an 
honest, elderly, sensitive bachelor, whose early history 
had been dashed with the romance of his having been 
jilted. Sir Roger does nothing and says nothing which 
might not have been said and done, in his day, by any 
warm-hearted rustic gentleman who had been irre- 
deemably crossed in love. Indeed, turning thus from 
Nature to the consummate Art which copied her, it 
can scarcely be denied that the character owes its 
immortality to the quaint traits of extravagance which 
have been stigmatized as blemishes : without impairing 
the efficacy of Sir Roger as a special admonitory 
example to the country esquire of the reign of Queen 
Anne, his oddities were destined to rivet the interest 



ADVERTISEMENT. Vll 

and excite the affectionate smile of all readers in all 
time. 

The essays which separate the Coverley papers from 
one another, however exquisite in themselves, break 
the spell which binds the reader while lingering over 
the benevolence or humour of the Worcestershire 
baronet. Even when arranged more conveniently in 
a sequence, as in this book, it is not pleasing to re- 
member that so captivating an Identity was originated 
and wa'ought out by ' several hands.' Every fresh 
lineament of the good Sir Roger so strengthens the 
sense of Unity, that we rather love to be deluded with 
the notion that the whole was the work of one mind. 
With all art so perfect that it conceals art, we prefer 
the ignorance which is our bliss, to the knowledge that 
reveals the companionships, contrivances, or agonies 
of authorcraft. Though curiosity is gratified, sentiment 
is hurt, when we are told that the outlines of Sir 
Roger de Coverley were imagined and partly traced 
by Sir Richard Steele ; that the colouring and more 
prominent lineaments were elaborated by Joseph Addi- 
son ; that some of the back-ground was put in by 
Eustace Budgell ; and, that the portrait was defaced 
by either Steele or Thomas Tickell, with a deformity 
which Addison repudiated, and which is not here re- 
produced. 



Vlll ADVERTISEMENT. 

The sum of the account in hard figures stands 
thus; — Sir Roger de Coverley's adventures, opin- 
ions, and conversations occur in thirty of the Spec- 
tator'^s papers. Of these, Addison wrote twenty, 
Budgell two, and Steele eight ; if it be certain that he 
was the author of the obnoxious portion of No. 410 ; 
which has also been attributed to Tickell. 

But over this divided labour, all evidence proves 
that Addison exercised a rigid and harmonizing edi- 
torial vigilance. In the words of an accurate critic, 
' Addison took the rude outlines into his own hands, 
retouched them, coloured them ; and is, in truth, the 
creator of the Sir Roger de Coverlet and the Will 
Honeycomb with whom we are all familiar.' The 
habits of Addison and Steele were those of a close 
literary partnership. What Steele's quick impatient 
genius planned, Addison's rich taste and thoughtful 
industry executed : what were, and would perhaps 
have ever remained, dreams in Steele's brain, came 
out distinct realities from under Addison's hand. Be- 
tween them Pope's maxim was fully obeyed : — 

' To write with fervour and correct with phlegm.' 

Steele supplied some of the fervour : Addison all the 
finish, all the phlegm. 

But, it must be repeated, those who love Sir Roger 



ADVERTISEMENT. IX 

DE CovERLEY love not these ungenial revelations. 
They Hke to feel that the fine-hearted creation comes 
from a single source ; — from those nicely-balanced 
stores of touching pathos and refined humour ; of 
sound common-sense and polished wit ; of keen satire 
and kind words ; of sharp observation and genial 
description, which exist in the single gentleman who 
paints his own portrait in the first pages, and who is 
known wherever English letters can be read, as 

'THE SPECTATOR.' 



CONTENTS. 



The Author 


's Preface .... 


. 1 


Chapter I. 


Sir Roger and the Club 


9 


II. 


Coverley Hall . 


18 


III. 


The Coverley Household 


. 24 


IV. 


The Coverley Guest 


30 


V. 


The Coverley Lineage 


. 36 


'* VI. 


The Coverley Ghost 


43 


" VII. 


The Coverley Sabbath . 


. 48 


" VIII. 


Sir Roger in Love . 


53 


IX. 


The Coverley CEconomy 


. 62 


X. 


The Coverley Hunt . 


67 


" XI. 


The Coverley Witch . 


. 76 


'' XII. 


A Coverley Love Match . 


82 


" XIII. 


The Coverley Etiquette 


. 89 


" XIV. 


The Coverley Ducks 


94 


" XV. 


Sir Roger on the Bench 


. 100 


" XVI. 


A Story of an Heir . 


106 


" XVII. 


Sir Roger and Party Spirit . 


. 114 


" xvm. 


On Gipseys in General 


121 


" XIX. 


A Summons to London 


. 125 


" XX. 


Farewell to Coverley Hall 


130 



xu 



CONTENTS. 



Chap. XXI. Sir Roger in London .... 136 
" XXII. Sir Roger in Westminster Abbey . 142 
" XXIII. Sir Roger at the Play-house . . 148 
Sir Roger at Vauxhall . . . 154 
Sir Roger, The Widow, Will Honey- 
comb, and Milton . . . 159 
Sir Roger passeth away . . . 164 



XXIV. 
XXV. 

XXVI. 



Notes and Illustrations. By W. H. Wills. 



171 



THE AUTHOR'S PREFACE. 

Non ficmum ex fulgore, sed ex fumo dare lucem 
Cogitat, ut spedosa dehinc miracula 'promat. 

HOR. 

T HAVE observed, that a Reader seldom peruses a 
-■- Book with Pleasure, until he knows whether the 
Writer of it be a black or a fair Man, of a mild or 
cholerick Disposition, Married or a Bachelor, with other 
Particulars of the like Nature, that conduce very much 
to the right Understanding of an Author. To gratify 
this Curiosity, which is so natural to a Reader, I design 
this Paper and my next as Prefatory Discourses to my 
following Writings, and shall give some Account in 
them of the several Persons that are engaged in this 
Work. As the chief Trouble of Compiling, Digest- 
ing, and Correcting, will fall to my Share, I must do 
myself the Justice to open the Work with my own 
History. 

I was born to a small Hereditary Estate, which, 
according to the Tradition of the Village where it 
lies, was bounded by the same Hedges and Ditches 
1 



2 THE author's preface. 

in William the Conqueror's Time that it is at present, 
and has been delivered down from Father to Son 
whole and entire, without the Loss or Acquisition of 
a single Field or Meadow, during the Space of six 
hundred Years. There runs a Story in the Family, 
that my Mother dreamt that she had brought forth 
a Judge : Whether this might proceed from a Law- 
Suit which was then depending in the Family, or 
my Father's being a Justice of the Peace, I cannot 
determine; for I am not so vain as to think it pre- 
saged any Dignity that I should arrive at in my future 
Life, though that was the Interpretation which the 
Neighbourhood put upon it. The Gravity of my 
Behaviour at my very first Appearance in the World, 
seemed to favour my Mother's Dream : For, as she 
has often told me, I threw away my Rattle before 
I was two Months old, and would not make use of 
my Coral until they had taken away the Bells from 

it. 

As for the rest of my Infancy, there being nothing 
in it remarkable, I shall pass it over in Silence. 1 
find, that, during my Nonage, I had the Reputation 
of a very sullen Youth, but was always a Favourite 
of my Schoolmaster, who used to say, that my Parts 
were solid, and would ivear well. I had not been 
long at the University, before I distinguished myself 



i 



by a most profound Silence ; for during the Space 
of eight Years, excepting in the publick Exercises 
of the College, I scarce uttered the Quantity of an 
hundred Words ; and indeed do not remember that 
I ever spoke three Sentences together in my whole 
Life. Whilst I was in this learned Body, I applied 
myself with so much Diligence to my Studies, that 
there are very few celebrated Books, either in the 
learned or the modern Tongues, which I am not 
acquainted with. 

Upon the Death of my Father, I was resolved to 
travel into foreign Countries, and therefore left the 
University, with the Character of an odd unaccount- 
able Fellow, that had a great deal of Learning, if 
I would but show it. An insatiable Thirst after Know- 
ledge carried me into all the Countries of Europe^ 
in which there was any thing new or strange to be 
seen ; nay, to such a Degree was my Curiosity raised, 
that having read the Controversies of some great Men 
concerning the Antiquities of Egypt, I made a Voy- 
age to Grand Cairo on purpose to take the Measure 
of a Pyramid : And as soon as I had set myself right 
in that Particular, returned to my native Country with 
great Satisfaction. 

I have passed my latter Years in this City, where 
I am frequently seen in most publick Places, though 



4 THE author's preface. 

there are not above half a dozen of my select Friends 
that know me ; of whom my next Paper shall give a 
more particular Account. There is no Place of gen- 
eral Resort, wherein I do not often make my Appear- 
ance ; sometimes I am seen thrusting my Head into 
a Round of Politicians at WiWs^ and listning with 
great Attention to the Narratives that are made in 
those little circular Audiences. Sometimes I smoke 
a Pipe at Child''s, and whilst I seem attentive to 
nothing but the Postman, overhear the Conversation 
of every Table in the Room. I appear on Sunday 
Nights at St. James'' s Coffee-house, and sometimes 
join the little Committee of Politicks in the Inner 
Room, as one who comes there to hear and improve 
My Face is likewise very well known at the Grecian 
the Cocoa-Tree, and in the Theatres both of Drury 
Lane and the Hay-Market. I have been taken for 
a Merchant upon the Exchange for above these ten 
Years, and sometimes pass for a Jew in the Assembly 
of Stock-jobbers at Jonathan'^s : In short, where-ever 
I see a Cluster of People, I always mix with them, 
though I never open my Lips but in my own Club. 

Thus I live in the World rather as a Spectator of 
Mankind, than as one of the Species ; by which Means 
I have made myself a Speculative Statesman, Soldier, 
Merchant, and Artisan, without ever meddling with 



THE author's preface. 5 

any practical Part in Life. I am very well versed 
in the Theory of a Husband or a Father, and can 
discern the Errors in the Oeconomy, Business, and 
Diversion of others, better than those who are engaged 
in them ; as Standers-by discover Blots, which are apt 
to escape those who are in the Game. I never es- 
poused any Party with Violence, and am resolved to 
observe an exact Neutrality between the Whigs and 
Tories, unless I shall be forced to declare myself by 
the Hostilities of either Side. In short, I have acted 
in all the Parts of my Life as a Looker-on, which is 
the Character I intend to preserve in this Paper. 

There are three very material Points which I 
have not spoken to in this Paper; and which, for 
several important Reasons, I must keep to myself, at 
least for some Time ; I mean, an Account of my 
Name, my Age, and my Lodgings. I must confess, 
I would gratify my Reader in any Thing that is rea- 
sonable ; but as for these three Particulars, though I 
am sensible they might tend very much to the Em- 
bellishment of my Paper, I cannot yet come to a 
Resolution of communicating them to the Publick. 
They would indeed draw mc out of that Obscurity 
which I have enjoyed for many Years, and expose 
me in publick Places to several Salutes and Civilities, 
which have been always very disagreeable to me ; 



b THE AUTHOR S PREFACE. 

for the greatest Pain I can suffer, is the being talked 
to, and being stared at. It is for this Reason likewise, 
that I keep my Complexion and Dress as very great 
Secrets ; though it is not impossible, but I may make 
Discoveries of both in the Progress of the Work I 
have undertaken. 

After having been thus particular upon myself, 
I shall in To-morrow's Paper give an Account of 
those Gentlemen who are concerned with me in this 
Work ; for, as I have before intimated, a Plan of it 
is laid and concerted (as all other Matters of Impor- 
tance are) in a Club. However, as my Friends have 
engaged me to stand in the Front, those who have a 
Mind to correspond with me, may direct their Letters 
to the Spectator, at Mr. Buckley''s in Little-Britain. 
For I must further acquaint the Reader, that though 
our Club meets only on Tuesdays and Thursdays^ we 
have appointed a Committee to sit every Night, for 
the inspection of all such Papers as may contribute 
to the Advancement of the Publick Weal. 

The Spectator. 
London, Thursday, March 1, 1710-11. 



Sit iSiOQtV 33e ©OiltVUff* 



Sir Roger De Coverley. 



CHAPTER I. 

Sir Roger and the Club. 

Ast alii sex 
Et plures uno condamant ore. 



Juv. 



rF HE first of our Society is a Gentleman of Worces- 
•^ tershire^ of ancient Descent, a Baronet, his Name 
Sir Roger de Coverley. His Great Grandfather was 
Inventor of that famous Country-Dance which is called 
after him. All who know that Shire are very well 
acquainted with the Parts and Merits of Sir Roger. 
He is a Gentleman that is very singular in his Beha- 
viour, but his Singularities proceed from his good 
Sense, and are Contradictions to the Manners of the 
World, only as he thinks the World is in the wrong. 
However, this Humour creates him no Enemies, for 
he does nothing with Sourness or Obstinacy ; and his 
being unconfined to Modes and Forms, makes him 
but the readier and more capable to please and oblige 



10 SIR ROGER AND THE CLUB. 

all who know him. When he is in Town, he lives 
in Soho-Square. It is said, he keeps himself a Bach- 
elor by reason he was crossed in Love by a perverse 
beautiful Widow of the next County to him. Before 
this disappointment, Sir Roger was what you call a 
fine Gentleman, had often supped with my Lord 
Rochester and Sir George Etherege^ fought a Duel 
upon his first coming to Town, and kicked Bully 
Dawson in a publick Coffee-house for calling him 
Youngster. But being ill used by the above-men- 
tioned Widow, he was very serious for a Year and 
a half; and, though his Temper being naturally jovial, 
he at last got over it, he grew careless of himself, 
and never dressed afterwards. He continues to wear 
a Coat and Doublet of the same Cut that were in 
Fashion at the Time of his Repulse, which, in his 
merry Humours, he tells us, has been in and out 
twelve Times since he first wore it. He is now in his 
fifty-sixth Year, cheerful, gay, and hearty; keeps a 
good House both in Town and Country ; a great 
Lover of Mankind ; but there is such a mirthful Cast 
in his Behaviour, that he is rather beloved than es- 
teemed. His Tenants grow rich, his Servants look 
satisfied, all the young Women profess Love to him, 
and the young Men are glad of his Company : When 
he comes into a House he calls the Servants bv their 



SIR ROGEU AND THE CLUB. 11 

Names, and talks all the Way up Stairs to a Visit. 
I must not omit, that Sir Roger is a Justice of the 
Quorum ; that he fills the Chair at a Quarter-Session 
with great Abilities, and three Months ago gained 
universal Applause by Explaining a Passage in the 
Game-Act. 

The Gentleman next in Esteem and Authority among 
us, is another Bachelor, who is a Member of the Inner- 
Temple ; a Man of great Probity, Wit, and Under- 
standing ; but he has chosen his Place of Residence 
rather to obey the Direction of an old humoursom 
Father, than in pursuit of his own Inclinations. He 
was placed there to study the Laws of the Land, and 
is the most learned of any of the House in those of 
the Stage. Aristotle and Longinus are much better 
understood by him than Littleton or Coke. The 
Father sends up every Post Questions relating to 
Marriage-Articles, Leases, and Tenures, in the Neigh- 
bourhood ; all which Questions he agrees with an At- 
torney to answer and take care of in the Lump. He 
is studying the Passions themselves, when he should 
be inquiring into the Debates among Men which arise 
from them. He knows the Argument of each of the 
Orations of Demosthenes and Tidhj, but not one Case 
in the Reports of our own Courts. No one ever took 
him for a Fool, but none, except his intimate Friends, 



12 SIR ROGER AND THE CLUB. 

know he has a great deal of Wit. This Turn makes 
him at once both disinterested and agreeable : As few 
of his Thoughts are drawn from Business, they are 
most of them fit for Conversation. His Taste of 
Books is a little too just for the Age he lives in ; he 
has read all, but approves of very few. His Famili- 
arity with the Customs, Manners, Actions, and Writ- 
ings of the Ancients, makes him a very delicate 
Observer of what occurs to him in the present World. 
He is an excellent Critick, and the Time of the Play 
is his Hour of Business ; exactly at five he passes 
through NeW'Inn, crosses through Russell- Court, and 
takes a turn at WiWs till the Play begins ; he has his 
Shoes rubbed and his Periwig powdered at the Barber's 
as you go into the Rose. It is for the Good of the 
Audience when he is at a Play, for the Actors have an 
Ambition to please him. 

The Person of next Consideration, is Sir Andrew 
Freeport, a Merchant of great Eminence in the City 
of London. A Person of indefatigable Industry, strong 
Reason, and great Experience. His Notions of Trade 
are noble and generous, and (as every rich Man has 
usually some sly Way of Jesting, which would make 
no great Figure were he not a rich Man) he calls the 
Sea the British Common. He is acquainted with 
Commerce in all its Parts, and will tell you that it is a 



SIR ROGER AND THE CLUB. 13 

stupid and barbarous Way to extend Dominion by 
Arms ; for true Power is to be got by Arts and In- 
dustry. He will often argue, tbat if tbis Part of our 
Trade were well cultivated, we should gain from one 
Nation ; and if another, from another. I have heard 
him prove, that Diligence makes more lasting Ac- 
quisitions than Valour, and that Sloth has ruined more 
Nations than the Sword. He abounds in several 
frugal Maxims, amongst which the greatest Favourite 
is, ' A Penny saved is a Penny got ;' ' A general Trader 
of good Sense is pleasanter Company than a general 
Scholar ; ' and Sir Andrew having a natural unaffected 
Eloquence, the Perspicuity of his Discourse gives the 
same Pleasure that Wit would in another Man. He 
has made his Fortunes himself; and says that England 
may be richer than other Kingdoms, by as plain Me- 
thods as he himself is richer than other Men ; though 
at the same time I can say this of him, that there is 
not a Point in the Compass but blows home a Ship in 
which he is an Owner. 

Next to Sir Andrew in the Club-Room sits Captain 
Sentrey, a Gentleman of great Courage, good Under- 
standing, but invincible Modesty. He is one of those 
that deserve very well, but are very awkward at 
putting their Talents within the Observation of such as 
should take notice of them. He was some Years a 



14 SIR ROGER AND THE CLUB. 

Captain, and behaved himself with great Gallantry in 
several Engagements and at several Sieges ; but hav- 
ing a small Estate of his own, and being next Heir to 
Sir Roger, he has quitted a Way of Life in which no 
Man can rise suitably to his Merit, who is not some- 
thing of a Courtier as well as a Soldier. I have heard 
him often lament, that in a Profession where Merit is 
placed in so conspicuous a View, Impudence should 
get the better of Modesty. When he has talked to 
this Purpose I never heard him make a sour Ex- 
pression, but frankly confess that he left the World, 
because he was not fit for it. A strict Honesty and an 
even regular Behaviour, are in themselves Obstacles to 
him that must press through Crowds, who endeavour 
at the same End with himself, the Favour of a Com- 
mander. He will however in his way of Talk excuse 
Generals, for not disposing according to Men's Desert, 
or enquiring into it : For, says he, that great Man who 
has a Mind to help me, has as many to break through 
to come at me, as I have to come at him : Therefore 
he will conclude, that the Man who would make a 
Figure, especially in a Military Way, must get over 
all false Modesty, and assist his Patron against the 1 
Importunity of other Pretenders, by a proper Assur- 
ance in his own Vindication. He says it is a civil 
Cowardise to be backward in asserting what you ought 



SIR ROGER AND THE CLUB. 15 

to expect, as it is a military Fear to be slow in at- 
tacking when it is your Duty. With this Candour does 
the Gentleman speak of himself and others. The 
same Frankness runs through all his Conversation. 
The military Part of his Life has furnished him with 
many Adventures, in the Relation of which he is very 
agreeable to the Company ; for he is never over- 
bearing, though accustomed to command Men in the 
utmost Degree below him ; nor ever too obsequious 
from an Habit of obeying Men highly above him. 

But that our Society may not appear a Set of 
Humourists unacquainted with the Gallantries and 
Pleasures of the Age, we have among us the gallant 
Will Honeycomb, a Gentleman who according to his 
Years should be in the Decline of his Life, but having 
ever been very careful of his Person, and always had 
a very easy Fortune, Time has made but a very little 
Impression, either by Wrinkles on his Forehead, or 
Traces in his Brain. His Person is well turned, of 
a good Height. He is very ready at that sort of 
Discourse with which Men usually entertain Women. 
He has all his Life dressed very well, and remembers 
Habits as others do Men. He can smile when one 
speaks to him, and laughs easily. He knows the 
History of every Mode, and can inform you from 
which of the French King's Wenches our Wives and 



16 SIR ROGER AND THE CLUB. 

Daughters had this Manner of curling their Hair, that 
Way of placing their Hoods ; whose Frailty was cov- 
ered by such a sort of Petticoat, and whose Vanity 
to shew her Foot made that Part of the Dress so short 
in such a Year. In a word, all his Conversation and 
Knowledge have been in the female World : as other 
Men of his Age will take Notice to you what such a 
Minister said upon such and such an Occasion, he 
will tell you when the Duke of Monmouth danced 
at Court, such a Woman was then smitten, another 
was taken with him at the Head of his Troop in the 
Park. In all these important Relations, he has ever 
about the same time received a kind Glance or a 
Blow of a Fan from some celebrated Beauty, Mother 
of the present Lord such-a-one. If you speak of a 
young Commoner that said a lively thing in the House, 
he starts up, ' He has good Blood in his Veins, Tom 
' Mirahell, the Rogue, cheated me in that Affair : 
' that young Fellow's Mother used me more like a 
' Dog than any Woman I ever made Advances to.' 
This way of Talking of his very much enlivens the 
Conversation among us of a more sedate Turn ; and 
I find there is not one of the Company, but myself, 
who rarely speak at all, but speaks of him as of that 
sort of Man who is usually called a well-bred fine 
Gentleman. To conclude his Character, where Wo- 
men are not concerned, he is an honest worthy Man. 



SIR ROGER AND THE CLUB. 17 

I cannot tell whether I am to account him whom 
I am next to speak of, as one of our Company ; for 
he visits us but seldom, but when he does, it adds to 
every Man else a new Enjoyment of himself. He is 
a Clergyman, a very Philosophick Man, of general 
Learning, great Sanctity of Life, and the most exact 
good Breeding. He has the Misfortune to be of a 
very weak Constitution, and, consequently, cannot 
accept of such Cares and Business as Preferments in 
his Function would oblige him to : He is therefore 
among Divines what a Chamber-Counsellor is amono- 
Lawyers. The Probity of his Mind, and the Integrity 
of his Life, create him Followers, as being eloquent 
or loud advances others. He seldom introduces the 
Subject he speaks upon ; but we are so far gone in 
Years, that he observes, when he is among us, an 
Earnestness to have him fall on some divine Topick, 
which he always treats with much Authority, as one 
who has no Interests in this World, as one who is 
hastening to the Object of all his Wishes, and conceives 
Hope from his Decays and Infirmities. These are 
my ordinary Companions. 



CHAPTER II. 

CovERLEY Hall. 

Hinc tibi Copia 
Manabit ad plenum, benigno 
Muris honorum opulenta cornu. Hor. 

TTAVING often received an Invitation from my 
-^-^ Friend Sir Roger de Coverley, to pass away a 
Month with him in the Country, I last Week accom- 
panied him thither, and am settled with him for some 
Time at his Country-house, where I intend to form 
several of my ensuing Speculations. Sir Roger, who 
is very well acquainted with my Humour, lets me rise 
and go to Bed when I please, dine at his own Table 
or in my Chamber as I think fit, sit still and say 
nothing without bidding me be merry. When the 
Gentlemen of the County come to see him, he only 
shows me at a Distance : As I have been walking in 
his Fields I have observed them stealing a Sight of 
me over an Hedge, and have heard the Knight desir- 
ing them not to let me see them, for that I hated to 
be stared at. 



COVERLET HALL. 19 

I am the more at Ease in Sir Roger's Family, 
because it consists of sober and staid Persons ; for as 
the Knight is the best Master in the World, he seldom 
changes his Servants ; and as he is beloved by all 
about him, his Servants never care for leaving him ; 
by this means his Domesticks are all in Years, and 
grown old with their Master. You would take his 
Valet de Chambre for his Brother, his Butler is grey- 
headed, his Groom is one of the gravest Men that I 
have ever seen, and his Coachman has the Looks of 
a Privy-Counsellor. You see the Goodness of the 
Master even in the old House-dog, and in a gray Pad 
that is kept in the Stable with great Care and Ten- 
derness, out of Regard to his past Services, though 
he has been useless for several Years. 

I could not but observe with a great deal of Pleasure 
the Joy that appeared in the Countenances of these 
ancient Domesticks, upon my Friend's Arrival at his 
Country-Seat. Some of them could not refrain from 
Tears at the Sight of their old Master ; every one of 
them pressed forward to do something for him, and 
seemed discouraged if they were not employed. At 
the same time the good old Knight, with a Mixture 
of the Father and the Master of the Family, tempered 
the Inquiries after his own Affairs with several kind 
Questions relating to themselves. This Humanity 



20 COVERLEY HALL. 

and Good -nature engages every Body to him, so that 
when he is pleasant upon any of them, all his Family 
are in good Humour, and none so much as the Person 
whom he diverts himself with : On the contrary, if he 
coughs, or betrays any Infirmity of old Age, it is easy 
for a Stander-by to observe a secret Concern in the 
Looks of all his Servants. 

My worthy Friend has put me under the particular 
Care of his Butler, who is a very prudent Man, and, 
as well as the rest of his Fellow-Servants, wonderfully 
desirous of pleasing me, because they have often 
heard their Master talk of me as of his particular 
Friend. 

My chief Companion, when Sir Roger is divert- 
ing himself in the Woods or the Fields, is a very 
venerable Man who is ever with Sir Roger, and has 
lived at his House in the Nature of a Chaplain above 
thirty Years. This Gentleman is a Person of good 
Sense and some Learning, of a very regular Life 
and obliging Conversation : He heartily loves Sir 
Roger, and knows that he is very much in the old 
Knight's Esteemv, so that he lives in the Family rather 
as a Relation than a Dependent. 

I have observed in several of my Papers, that my 
Friend Sir Roger, amidst all his good Qualities, is 
something of an Humourist ; and that his Virtues, as 



COVERLEY HALL. 21 

well as Imperfections, are as it were tinged by a 
certain Extravagance, which makes them particularly 
Jiis, and distinguishes them from those of other Men. 
This Cast of Mind, as it is generally very innocent 
in itself, so it renders his Conversation highly agree- 
able, and more delightful than the same Degree of 
Sense and Virtue would appear in their common and 
ordinary Colours. As I was walking with him last 
Night, he asked me how I liked the good Man whom 
I have just now mentioned .? and without staying for 
my Answer told me, That he was afraid of being 
insulted with Latin and Greek at his own Table ; for 
which Reason he desired a particular Friend of his 
at the University, to find him out a Clergyman rather 
of plain Sense than much Learning, of a good As- 
pect, a clear Voice, a sociable Temper ; and, if pos- 
sible, a Man that understood a little of Back-Gammon. 
My Friend, says Sir Roger, found me out this Gen- 
tleman, who, besides the Endowments required of 
him, is, they tell me, a good Scholar, though he does 
not shew it : I have given him the Parsonage of the 
Parish ; and because I know his Value, have settled 
upon him a good Annuity for Life. If he outlives 
me, he shall find that he was higher in my Esteem 
than perhaps he thinks he is. He has now been with 
me thirty Years ; and though he does not know I have 



22 COVERLET HALL. 

taken notice of it, has never in all that time asked any 
thing of me for himself, though he is every Day 
solicitincr me for somethincr in Behalf of one or other 
of my Tenants his Parishioners. There has not been 
a Law-suit in the Parish since he has lived amonsr 
them : if any Dispute arises they apply themselves to 
him for the Decision ; if they do not acquiesce in his 
Judgment, which I think never happened above once 
or twice at most, they appeal to me. At his first 
settling with me, I made him a Present of all the good 
Sermons which have been printed in English^ and 
only begged of him that every Sunday he would 
pronounce one of them in the Pulpit. Accordingly 
he has digested them into such a Series, that they 
follow one another naturally, and make a continued 
System of practical Divinity. 

As Sir Roger was going on in his Story, the 
Gentleman we were talking of came up to us ; and 
upon the Knight's asking him who preached To- 
morrow (for it was Saturday Night) told us, the 
Bishop of St. Asaph in the Morning, and Dr. South 
in the Afternoon. He then shewed us his List of 
Preachers for the whole Year, where I saw with a 
great deal of Pleasure Archbishop Tillotson, Bishop 
Saunderson, Dr. Barrow, Dr. CaJa?ny, with several 
living Authors who have published Discourses of 



I 



COVERLEY HALL. 23 



Practical Divinity. I no sooner saw this venerable 
Man in the Pulpit, but I very much approved of my 
Friend's insisting upon the Qualifications of a good 
Aspect and a clear Voice ; for 1 was so charmed with 
the Gracefulness of his Figure and Delivery, as well 
as with the Discourses he pronounced, that I think I 
never passed any Time more to my Satisfaction. A 
Sermon repeated after this Manner, is like the Com- 
position of a Poet in the Mouth of a graceful Actor. 
I could heartily wish that more of our Country- 
Clergy would follow this Example ; and instead of 
wasting their Spirits in laborious Compositions of their 
own, would endeavour after a handsom Elocution, 
and all those other Talents that are proper to enforce 
what has been penned by greater Masters. This 
would not only be more easy to themselves, but more 
edifying to the People. 



CHAPTER III. 

The Coverley Household. 

JEsopo ingentem statvam posuere Attici, 
Servumque collocdrvnt JEterna in Bast, 
Patere honoris scirent ut Cunctis viam. 

nPHE Reception, manner of Attendance, undisturbed 
Freedom and Quiet, which I meet with here in the 
Country, has confirmed me in the Opinion 1 always 
had, that the general Corruption of Manners in Ser- 
vants is owing to the Conduct of Masters. The 
Aspect of every one in the Family carries so much 
Satisfaction, that it appears he knows the happy Lot 
which has befallen him in being a Member of it. 
There is one Particular which I have seldom seen 
but at Sir Roger's ; it is usual in all other places, that 
Servants fly from the Parts of the House through 
which their Master is passing : on the contrary, here 
they industriously place themselves in his Way ; and 
it is on both Sides, as it were, understood as a Visit, 
when the Servants appear without calling. This 



THE COVERLET HOUSEHOLD. 25 

proceeds from the human and equal Temper of the 
Man of the House, who also perfectly well knows how 
to enjoy a great Estate, with such Oeconomy as ever 
to be much beforehand. This makes his own Mind 
untroubled, and consequently unapt to vent peevish 
Expressions, or give passionate or inconsistent Orders 
to those about him. Thus Respect and Love go 
together ; and a certain Chearfulness in Performance 
of their Duty is the particular Distinction of the lower 
Part of this Family. • When a Servant is called before 
his Master, he does not come with an Expectation to 
hear himself rated for some trivial Fault, threatened 
to be stripped or used with any other unbecoming 
Language, which mean Masters often give to worthy 
Servants ; but it is often to know, what Road he took 
that he came so readily back according to Order ; 
whether he passed by such a Ground, if the old Man 
who rents it is in good Health ; or whether he gave 
Sir Roger's Love to him, or the like. 

A Man who preserves a Respect, founded on his 
Benevolence to his Dependents, lives rather like a 
Prince than a Master in his Family ; his Orders are 
received as Favours, rather than Duties ; and the 
Distinction of approaching him is Part of the Reward 
for executing what is commanded by him. 

There is another Circumstance in which my Friend 



26 THE COVERLEY HOUSEHOLD. 

excels in his Management, which is the Manner of 
rewarding his Servants : He has ever been of Opinion, 
that giving his cast Clothes to be worn by Valets has a 
very ill effect upon little Minds, and creates a silly 
Sense of Equality between the Parties, in Persons 
affected only with outward things. I have heard him 
often pleasant on this Occasion, and describe a young 
Gentleman abusing his Man in that Coat, which a 
Month or two before was the most pleasing Distinction 
he was conscious of in himself. He would turn his 
Discourse still more pleasantly upon the Ladies' Boun- 
ties of this kind ; and I have heard him say he knew 
a fine Woman, who distributed Rewards and Punish- 
ments in giving becoming or unbecoming Dresses to 
her Maids. 

But my good Friend is above these little Instances 
of Good-will, in bestowing only Trifles on his Ser- 
vants ; a good Servant to him is sure of having it in 
his Choice very soon of being no Servant at all. As I 
before observed, he is so good an Husband, and knows 
so thoroughly that the Skill of the Purse is the 
Cardinal Virtue of this Life ; I say, he knows so well 
that Frugality is the Support of Generosity, that he 
can often spare a large Fine when a Tenement falls, 
and give that Settlement to a good Servant who has a 
mind to go into the World, or make a Stranger pay 



THE COVERLEY HOUSEHOLD. 27 

the Fine to that Servant, for his more comfortable 
Maintenance, if he stays in his Service. 

A Man of Honour and Generosity considers it would 
be miserable to himself to have no Will but that of 
another, though it were of the best Person breathing, 
and for that Reason goes on as fast as he is able to 
put his Servants into independent Livelihoods. The 
greatest Part of Sir Roger's Estate is tenanted by 
Persons who have served himself or his Ancestors. 
It was to me extremely pleasant to observe the 
Visitants from several Parts to welcome his Arrival 
into the Country ; and all the Difference that I could 
take notice of between the late Servants who came to 
see him, and those who staid in the Family, was that 
these latter were looked upon as finer Gentlemen and 
better Courtiers. 

This Manumission and placing them in a way of 
Livelihood, I look upon as only what is due to a good 
Servant, which Encouragement will make his Suc- 
cessor be as diligent, as humble, and as ready as he 
was. There is somethino; wonderful in the Narrow- 
ness of those Minds, which can be pleased, and be 
barren of Bounty to those who please them. 

One might, on this Occasion, recount the Sense that 
Great Persons in all Ages have had of the Merit of 
their Dependents, and the Heroic Services which Men 



28 THE COVERLET HOUSEHOLD. 

have done their Masters in the Extremity of their 
Fortunes ; and shewn to their undone Patrons, that 
Fortune was all the Difference between them ; but as 
I design this my Speculation only as a gentle Ad- 
monition to thankless Masters, I shall not go out of 
the Occurrences of common Life, but assert it as 
a general Observation, that I never saw, but in Sir 
Roger's Family, and one or two more, good Servants 
treated as they ought to be. Sir Roger's Kindness 
extends to their Children's Children, and this very 
Morning he sent his Coachman's Grandson to Prentice. 
I shall conclude this Paper with an Account of a 
Picture in his Gallery, where there are many which 
will deserve my future Observation. 

At the very upper End of this handsom Structure I 
saw the Portraiture of two young Men standing in a 
River, the one Naked, the other in a Livery. The 
Person supported seemed half Dead, but still so much 
alive as to shew in his Face exquisite Joy and Love ! 
towards the other. I thouo-ht the faintino; Figure 
resembled my Friend Sir Roger ; and looking at the 
Butler, who stood by me, for an Account of it, he 
informed me that the Person in the Livery was a 
Servant of Sir Roger's, who stood on the Shore while 
his Master was swimming, and observing him taken 
with some sudden Illness, and sink under Water, 



THE COVERLEY HOUSEHOLD. 29 

jumped in and saved him. He told me Sir Roger 
took off the Dress he was in as soon as he came home, 
and by a great Bounty at that time, followed by his 
Favour ever since, had made him Master of that pretty 
Seat which we saw at a distance as we came to this 
House. I remembered indeed Sir Roger said there 
lived a very worthy Gentleman, to whom he was 
highly obliged, without mentioning any thing further. 
Upon my looking a little dissatisfyed at some part of 
the Picture, mv Attendant informed me that it was 
against Sir Roger's Will, and at the earnest Request 
of the Gentleman himself, that he was drawn in the 
Habit in which he had saved his Master. 



CHAPTER lY. 

The Coverley Guest. 
Gratis anhelans, multa agendo nihil agens. Ph^dr. 

A S I was Yesterday Morning walking with Sir 
-^^ Roger before his House, a Country-Fellow brought 
him a huge Fish, which, he told him, Mr. William 
Wimble had caught that very Morning ; and that he 
presented it, with his Service to him, and intended to 
come and dine with him. At the same time he 
delivered a Letter, which my Friend read to me as 
soon as the Messenger left him. 

' Sir Roger, 
' T Desire you to accept of a Jack, which is the best 
' -^ I have caught this Season. I intend to come and 
' stay with you a Week, and see how the Perch bite in 
' the Black River. I observed with some Concern, 
' the last time I saw you upon the Bovv^ling-Green, that 
' your Whip wanted a Lash to it ; I will bring half a 



THE COVERLEY GUEST. 31 

' dozen with me that I twisted last Week, which I 
' hope will serve you all the Time you are in the 
' Country. I have not been out of the Saddle for six 
' Days last past, having been at Eaton with Sir Johri's 
' eldest Son. He takes to his Learning hugely. I am, 
' iSJ-R, Your Humble Servant^ 

' Will Wimble.' 

This extraordinary Letter, and Message that ac- 
companied it, made me very curious to know the 
Character and Quality of the Gentleman who sent 
them ; which I found to be as follows. Will Wimhle 
is younger Brother to a Baronet, and descended of the 
ancient Family of the Wi7nhles. He is now between 
Forty and Fifty ; but being bred to no Business and 
born to no Estate, he generally lives with his elder 
Brother as Superintendant of his Game. He hunts a 
Pack of Dogs better than any Man in the Country, and 
is very famous for finding out a Hare. He is 
extremely well versed in all the little Handicrafts of 
an idle Man : He makes a May-fly to a Miracle ; and 
furnishes the whole Country with Angle-Rods. As 
he is a good-natured officious Fellow, and very much 
esteemed upon Account of his Family, he is a wel- 
come Guest at every House, and keeps up a good 
Correspondence among all the Gentlemen about him. 



32 THE COVERLEY GUEST. 

He carries a Tulip-Root in his Pocket from one to 
another, or exchanges a Puppy between a Couple of 
Friends that live perhaps in the opposite Sides of the 
Country. Will is a particular Favourite of all the 
young Heirs, whom he frequently obliges with a Net 
that he has weaved, or a Setting-dog that he has made 
himself. He now and then presents a Pair of Garters 
of his own knitting to their Mothers or Sisters ; and 
raises a great deal of Mirth among them, by inquiring 
as often as he meets them how they laear ? These 
Gentleman-like Manufactures and obliging little hu- 
mours make Will the Darling of the Country. 

Sir Roger was proceeding in the Character of him, 
when we saw him make up to us with two or three 
Hazle-twigs in his Hand that he had cut in Sir 
Roger's Woods, as he came through them, in his 
Way to the Plouse, I was very much pleased to 
observe on one Side the hearty and sincere Welcome 
with which Sir Roger received him, and on the other, 
the secret Joy which his Guest discovered at Sight of 
the good old Knight. After the first Salutes were 
over, Will desired Sir Roger to lend him one of his 
Servants to carry a Set of Shuttlecocks he had with 
him in a little Box to a Lady that lived about a Mile 
off, to whom it seems he had promised such a Present 
for above this half year. Sir Roger's Back was no 



THE COVERLEY GUEST. 33 

sooner turned but honest Will began to tell me of a 
large Cock-pheasant that he had sprung in one of the 
neighbouring Woods, with two or three other Adven- 
tures of the same Nature. Odd and uncommon 
Characters are the Game that I look for, and most 
delight in ; for which Reason I was as much pleased 
with the Novelty of the Person that talked to me, as 
he could be for his Life with the springing of a 
Pheasant, and therefore listened to him with more 
than ordinary Attention. 

In the midst of his Discourse the Bell rung to 
Dinner, where the Gentleman I have been speaking of 
had the Pleasure of seeing the huge Jack, he had 
caught, served up for the first Dish in a most sump- 
tuous Manner. Upon our sitting down to it he gave 
us a long Account how he had hooked it, played with 
it, foiled it, and at length drew it out upon the Bank, 
with several other Particulars that lasted all the first 
Course. A Dish of Wild-fowl that came afterwards 
furnished Conversation for the rest of the Dinner, 
which concluded with a late Invention of WiWs for 
improving the Quail-pipe. 

Upon withdrawing into my Room after Dinner, I 

was secretly touched with Compassion towards the 

honest Gentleman that had dined with us ; and could 

not but consider with a great deal of Concern, how so 

3 



34 THE COVERLET GUEST. 

good an Heart and such busy Hands were wholly 
employed in Trifles ; that so much Humanity should 
be so little beneficial to others, and so much Industry 
so little advantageous to himself. The same Temper 
of Mind and Application to Affairs might have recom- 
mended him to the publick Esteem, and have raised 
his Fortune in another Station of Life. What Good 
to his Country or himself might not a Trader or a 
Merchant have done with such useful though ordinary 
Qualifications ? 

Will Wimble's is the Case of many a younger 
Brother of a great Family, who had rather see their 
Children starve like Gentlemen, than thrive in a Trade 
or Profession that is beneath their Quality. This 
Humour fills several Parts of Europe with Pride and 
Beggary. It is the Happiness of a Trading Nation, 
like ours, that the younger Sons, though uncapable of 
any liberal Art or Profession, may be placed in such 
a Way of Life, as may perhaps enable them to vie 
with the best of their Family : Accordingly we find 
several Citizens that were launched into the World 
with narrow Fortunes, rising by an honest Industry to 
greater Estates than those of their elder Brothers. It 
is not improbable but Will was formerly tried at 
Divinity, Law, or Physick ; and that finding his Genius 
did not lie that Way, his Parents gave him up at 



THE COVERLET GUEST. 35 

length to his own Inventions. But certainly, however 
improper he might have been for Studies of a higher 
Nature, he was perfectly well turned for the Occu- 
pations of Trade and Commerce. 



CHAPTER V. 

The Coverley Lineage. 
Abnormis sapiens Horace. 

T WAS this Morning walking in the Gallery, when 
-*- Sir Roger entered at the End opposite to me, and 
advancing towards me, said he was glad to meet me 
among his Relations the De Coverlets, and hoped I 
liked the Conversation of so much good Company, 
who were as silent as myself. I knew he alluded to 
the Pictures, and as he is a Gentleman who does not 
a little value himself upon his ancient Descent, I 
expected he would give me some jl^.ccount of them. 
We were now arrived at the Upper-end of the Gal- 
lery, when the Knight faced towards one of the 
Pictures, and as we stood before it, he entered into the 
matter, after his blunt way of saying Things, as they 
occur to his Imagination, without regular Introduction, 
or Care to preserve the Appearance of Chain of 
Thought. 

' It is,' said he, ' worth while to consider the Force 



THE COVERLET LINEAGE. 37 

' of dress ; and how the Persons of one Age differ from 
' those of another, merely by that only. One may 
' observe also, that the general Fashion of one Age 
' has been followed by one particular Set of People in 
' another, and by them preserved from one Generation 
' to another. Thus the vast jetting Coat and small 
' Bonnet, which was the Habit in Harry the Seventh's 
' Time, is kept on in the Yeomen of the Guard ; not 
' without a good and politick View, because they look 
' a Foot taller, and a Foot and an half broader : Be- 
' sides that the Cap leaves the Face expanded, and 
' consequently more terrible, and fitter to stand at the 
' Entrance of Palaces. 

' This Predecessor of ours, you see, is dressed after 
' this manner, and his Cheeks would be no larger than 
' mine, were he in a Hat as I am. He was the last 
' Man that won a Prize in the Tilt- Yard (which is now 
' a Common Street before Whitehall). You see the 
' broken Lance that lies there by his right Foot ; He 
' shivered that Lance of his Adversary all to Pieces ; 
' and bearing himself, look you. Sir, in this manner, 
' at the same time he came within the Target of the 
' Gentleman who rode against him, and taking him 
' with incredible Force before him on the Pommel of 
'his Saddle, he in that manner rid the Turnament 
' over, with an Air that shewed he did it rather to 



38 THE COVERLET LINEAGE. 

' perform the Rule of the Lists, than expose his Ene- 
' my ; however, it appeared he knew how to make 
' use of a Victory, and with a gentle Trot he marched 
'up to a Gallery where their Mistress sat (for they 
'were Rivals), and let him down with laudable Cour- 
' tesy and pardonable Insolence. I don't know but it 
' might be exactly where the Coffee-house is now. 

' You are to know this my Ancestor was not only 
' of a military Genius, but fit also for the Arts of 
' Peace, for he played on the Bass- Viol as well as any 
' Gentleman at Court ; you see where his Viol hangs 
' by his Basket-hilt Sword. The Action at the Tilt- 
' Yard you may be sure won the fair Lady, who was a 
' Maid of Honour, and the greatest Beauty of her 
' Time ; here she stands the next Picture. You see, 
' Sir, my Great Great Great Grandmother has on the 
' new-fashioned Petticoat, except that the Modern is 
' gathered at the Waste ; my Grandmother appears 
' as if she stood in a large Drum, whereas the Ladies 
' now walk as if they were in a Go-Cart. For all this 
' Lady was bred at Court, she became an excellent 
' Country-Wife, she brought ten Children, and when 1 
' shew you the Library, you shall see in her own 
' Hand (allowing for the Difference of the Language) 
' the best Receipt now in England both for an Hasty- 
' pudding and a White-pot. 



THE COVERLEY LINEAGE. 39 

' If you please to fall back a little, because 'tis 
' necessary to look at the three next Pictures at one 
' View : these are three Sisters. She on the risht 

* Hand, who is so very beautiful, died a Maid : the 
' next to her, still handsomer, had the same Fate, 
' against her will ; this Homely Thing in the middle 
' had both their Portions added to her own, and was 
' stolen by a neighbouring Gentleman, a Man of Strat- 
' agem and Resolution, for he poisoned three Mastiffs 
' to come at her, and knocked down two Deer-stealers 
' in carrying her off. Misfortunes happen in all Fami- 
' lies : The Theft of this Romp and so much Money, 
' was no great matter to our Estate. But the next 
' Heir that possessed it was this soft Gentleman, whom 
' you see there : Observe the small Buttons, the little 
' Boots, the Laces, the Slashes about his Clothes, and 
' above all the Posture he is drawn in, (which to be 
'sure was his own choosing;) you see he sits with 
' one Hand on a Desk writinor and looking as it were 
' another way, like an easy Writer, or a Sonneteer : 
' He was one of those that had too much Wit to know 
' how to live in the World ; he was a Man of no Jus- 
' tice, but great Good-Manners ; he ruined every Body 

* that had any thing to do with him, but never said a 

* rude thing in his Life ; the most indolent Person in the 
' World, he would sign a Deed that passed away half 



40 THE COVERLET LINEAGE. 

' his Estate with his Gloves on, but would not put on 
' his Hat before a Lady if it were to save his Country. 
' He is said to be the first that made Love by squeez- 
' ing the Hand. He left the Estate with ten thousand 
' Pounds Debt upon it : but however by all Hands I 
' have been informed that he was every way the finest 
' Gentleman in the World. That Debt lay heavy on 
' our House for one Generation, but it was retrieved 
' by a Gift from that honest Man you see there, a 
* Citizen of our Name, but nothing at all akin to us. 
'■ I know Sir Andrew Freeport has said behind my 
' Back, that this Man was descended from one of the 
' ten Children of the Maid of Honour I shewed you 
' above ; but it was never made out. We winked at 
' the thing indeed, because Money was wanting at that 
'time.' 1 

Here I saw my Fi'iend a little embarrassed, and 
turned my Face to the next Portraiture. 

Sir Roger went on with his Account of the Gallery | 
m the following manner. 'This Man' (pointing to 
him I looked at) ' I take to be the Honour of our 
' House, Sir Humphrey de Coverley ; he was in ■» 
' his Dealings as punctual as a Tradesman, and as 
' generous as a Gentleman. He would have thought 
' himself as much undone by breaking his Word, as if 
' it were to be followed by Bankruptcy. He served 



THE COVERLET LINEAGE. 41 

* his Country as Knight of this Shire to his dying Day. 

* He found it no easy matter to maintain an Integrity 

* in his Words and Actions, even in things that re- 
' garded the Offices which were incumbent upon him, 
' in the Care of his own Affairs and Relations of Life, 
' and therefore dreaded (though he had great Talents) 
' to go into Employments of State, where he must be 
' exposed to the Snares of Ambition. Innocence of 
' Life and great Ability were the distinguishing Parts 
'of his Character; the latter, he had often observed, 
' had led to the Destruction of the former, and used 

* frequently to lament that Great and Good had not the 
' same Signification. He was an excellent Husband- 
' man, but had resolv'd not to exceed such a Degree 
' of Wealth ; all above it he bestowed in secret Boun- 
' ties many Years after the Sum he aimed at for his 
' own Use was attained. Yet he did not slacken his 
'Industry, but to a decent old Age spent the Life and 
' Fortune which was superfluous to himself, in the 

* Service of his Friends and Neighbours.' 

Here we were called to Dinner, and Sir Roger 
ended the Discourse of this Gentleman, by telling me, 
as we followed the Servant, that this his Ancestor was 
a brave Man, and narrowly escaped being killed in 
the Civil Wars; 'For,' said he, 'he was sent out of 
' the Field upon a private Message, the Day before the 
' Battle of Worcester.^ 



42 THE COVERLEY LINEAGE. * 

The Whim of narrowly escaping by having been 
within a Day of Danger, with other Matters above- 
mentioned, mixed with good Sense, left me at a loss 
whether I was more delighted with my Friend's 
Wisdom or Simplicity. 



4 



CHAPTER VI. 

The Coverley Ghost. 

Horror ubique animos^ simul ipsa silentia terrent. Yirg. 

A T a little distance from Sir Roger's House, among 
-^^ the Ruins of an old Abbey, there is a long Walk 
of aged Elms; which are shot up so very high, that 
when one passes under them, the Rooks and Crows 
that rest upon the Tops of them seem to be Cawing in 
another Region. I am very much delighted with this 
sort of Noise, which I consider as a kind of natural 
Prayer to that Being who supplies the Wants of his 
whole Creation, and who, in the beautiful Language 
of the Psalms, feedeth the young Ravens that call 
upon Him. I like this Retirement the better, because 
of an ill Report it lies under of bein^ haunted ; for 
which Reason (as I have been told in the Family) no 
living Creature ever walks in it besides the Chaplain. 
My good Friend the Butler desired me with a very 
grave Face not to venture myself in it after Sun-set, 
for that one of the Footmen had been almost frighted 



44 THE COVERLET GHOST. 

out of his Wits by a Spirit that appeared to him in the 
Shape of a black Horse without an Head ; to which he 
added, that about a Month ago one of the Maids 
coming home late that way with a Pail of Milk upon 
her Head, heard such a Rustling among the Bushes 
that she let it fall, 

I was taking a Walk in this Place last Night 
between the Hours of Nine and Ten, and could not 
but fancy it one of the most proper Scenes in the 
World for a Ghost to appear in. The E,uins of the 
Abbey are scattered up and down on every Side, and 
half covered with Ivy and Elder-Bushes, the Harbours 
of several solitary Birds which seldom make their 
Appearance till the Dusk of the Evening. The Place 
was formerly a Churchyard, and has still several 
Marks in it of Graves and Burying-Places. There is 
such an Echo among the old Ruins and Vaults, that if 
you stamp but a little louder than ordinary, you hear 
the Sound repeated. At the same time the Walk of 
Elms, with the Croaking of the Ravens which from 
time to time are heard from the Tops of them, looks 
exceeding solemn and venerable. These Objects 
naturally raise Seriousness and Attention ; and when 
Night heightens the Awfulness of the Place, and pours 
out her supernumerary Horrors upon every thing in it, 
I do not at all wonder that weak Minds fill it with 
Spectres and Apparitions. 



J 



THE COVERLET GHOST. 45 

]\Ir. Locke, in his Chapter of the Association of 
Ideas, has very curious Remarks to shew how by the 
Prejudice of Education one Idea often introduces into 
the Mind a whole Set that bear no Resemblance to 
one another in the Nature of things. Among several 
Examples of this Kind, he produces the following 
Instance. The Ideas of Gohlins and Sprights have 
really no more to do with Darkness than Light : 
Yet let hut a foolish Maid inculcate these often on 
the Mind of a Child, and raise them there together^ 
possibly he shall never he able to separate them again 
so long as he lives; but Darkness shall ever after- 
wards bring with it those frightful Ideas, and they 
shall be so joined that he can no more bear the one 
than the other. 

As I was walking in this Solitude, where the Dusk 
of the Evening conspired with so many other Oc- 
casions of Terror, I observed a Cow grazing not far 
from me, which an Imagination that was apt to startle 
might easily have construed into a black Horse with- 
out an Head : And I dare say the poor Footman lost 
his Wits upon some such trivial Occasion. 

My Friend Sir Rog]:r has often told me with a good 
deal of Mirth, that at his first coming to his Estate he 
found three Parts of his House altogether useless ; 
that the best Room in it had the Reputation of being 



46 THE COVERLEY GHOST. 

haunted, and by that means was locked up ; that 
Noises had been heard in his long Gallery, so that he 
could not get a Servant to enter it after eight o'Clock 
at Night ; that the Door of one of his Chambers was 
nailed up, because there went a Story in the Family 
that a Butler had formerly hang'd himself in it ; and 
that his Mother, who lived to a great Age, had shut up 
half the Rooms in the House, in which either her 
Husband, a Son, or Daughter had died. The Knight 
seeing his Habitation reduced to so small a Compass, 
and himself in a Manner shut out of his own House, 
upon the Death of his Mother ordered all the Apart- 
ments to be flung open and exorcised by his Chaplain, 
who lay in every Room one after another, and by that 
means dissipated the Fears which had so long reigned 
in the Family. 

I should not have been thus particular upon these 
ridiculous Horrors, did not I find them so very much 
prevail in all Parts of the Country. At the same Time 
I think a Person who is thus terrify'd with the Im- 
agination of Ghosts and Spectres much more reasona- 
ble than one who, contrary to the Report of all 
Historians sacred and profane, ancient and modern, 
and to the Traditions of all Nations, thinks the Ap- 
pearance of Spirits fabulous and groundless : Could 
not I give myself up to this general Testimony of 



THE COVERLEY GHOST. 47 

Mankind, I should to the Relations of particular Per- 
sons who are now living, and whom I cannot distrust 
in other Matters of Fact. I might here add, that not 
only the Historians, to whom we may join the Poets, 
but likewise the Philosophers of Antiquity have fa- 
voured this Opinion. 



CHAPTER YII. 

The Coverley Sabbath. 

'^6avuiiig uiv ttqcotu &st!g, ru^ito log diuy.sirai, 
Tiua. PytHAG. 

T AM always very well pleased with a Country Sun- 
-L day, and think, if keeping holy the seventh Day 
were only a human Institution, it would be the best 
Method that could have been thought of for the polish- 
ing and civilizing of Mankind. It is certain the Country- 
People would soon degenerate into a kind of Savages 
and Barbarians, were there not such frequent Returns 
of a stated Time, in which the whole Village meet 
together with their best Faces, and in their cleanliest 
Habits to converse with one another upon indifferent 
Subjects, hear their Duties explained to them, and join 
together in Adoration of the Supreme Being. Sunday 
clears away the Rust of the whole Week, not only as it 
refreshes in their Minds the Notions of Religion, but 
as it puts both the Sexes upon appearing in their most 
agreeable Forms, and exerting all such Qualities as 



i 



il 



THE COVERLEY SABBATH. 49 

are apt to give them a Figure in the Eye of the Vil- 
lage. A Country Fellow distinguishes himself as 

I much in the Church-yard^ as a Citizen does upon the 
Change^ the whole Parish-Politicks being generally 
discussed in that place either after Sermon or before 
the Bell rings. 

My Friend, Sir Roger, being a good Churchman, 
has beautified the Inside of his Church with several 
Texts of his own choosing : He has likewise given a 
handsom Pulpit-Cloth, and railed in the Communion- 

j Table at his own Expence. He has often told me^ 
that at his coming to his Estate he found his Par- 
ishioners very irregular ; and that in order to make 
them kneel and join in the Responses, he gave every 
one of them a Hassock and a Common-prayer-Book : 
and at the same time employed an itinerant Singing 
Master, who goes about the Country for that purpose, 
to instruct them rightly in the Tunes of tlie Psalms ; 
upon which they now veiy much valae themselves, 
and indeed out-do most of the Country Churches that 
I have ever heard. 

As Sir Roger is Landlord to the whole Congre- 
gation, he keeps them in very good Order, and will 
suffer no body to sleep in it besides himself; for if bj* 
Chance he has been surprised into a short Nap at 
Sermon, upon recovering out of it he stands up and 
4 



50 THE COVERLEY SABBATH. 

looks about him, and if he sees any Body else nodding, 
either wakes them himself, or sends his Servants to 
them. Several other of the old Knight's Particulari- 
ties break out upon these Occasions : Sometimes he 
will be lengthening out a Verse in the Singing-Psalms, 
half a Minute after the rest of the Congregation have 
done with it ; sometimes when he is pleased with the 
Matter of his Devotion, he pronounces Amen three or 
four times to the same Prayer; and sometimes stands 
up when every Body else is upon their Knees, to 
count the Congregation, or see if any of his Tenants 
are missing. 

I was yesterday very much surprised to hear my 
old Friend, in the midst of the Service, calling out to 
one John Matthews to mind what he was about, and 
not disturb the Congregation, This John Matthews it 
seems is remarkable for being an idle Fellow, and at 
that time was kicking his Heels for his Diversion. 
This Authority of the Knight, though exerted in that 
odd manner which accompanies him in all Circum- 
stances of Life, has a very good Effect upon the 
Parish, who are not polite enough to see any thing 
ridiculous in his Behaviour ; besides that the general 
good Sense and Worthiness of his Character makes 
his Friends observe these little Singularities as Foils 
that rather set off than blemish his good Qualities. 



J 



THE COVERLET SABBATH. 51 

As soon as the Sermon is finished, nobody pre- 
sumes to stir till Sir Roger is gone out of the Church. 
The Knight walks down from his Seat in the Chancel 
between a double Row of his Tenants, that stand 
bowing to him on each Side ; and every now and then 
inquires how such an one's Wife, or Mother, or Son, 
or Father do, whom he does not see at Church ; 
which is understood as a secret Reprimand to the 
Person that is absent. 

The Chaplain has often told me, that upon a Cate- 
chising Day, when Sir Roger has been pleased with 
a Boy that answers well, he has ordered a Bible to be 
given him next Day for his Encouragement ; and 
sometimes accompanies it with a Flitch of Bacon to 
his Mother. Sir Roger has likewise added five 
Pounds a Year to the Clerk's Place ; and that he may 
encourage the young Fellows to make themselves 
perfect in the Church-Service, has promised upon the 
Death of the present Incumbent, who is very old, to 
bestow it according to Merit. 

The fair Understanding between Sir Roger and his 
Chaplain, and their mutual Concurrence in doing 
Good, is the more remarkable, because the very next 
Village is famous for the Differences and Contentions 
that rise between the Parson and the 'Squire, who live 
in a perpetual State of War. The Parson is always 



52 THE COVERLET SABBATH. 

preaching at the 'Squire, and the 'Squire to be re- 
venged on the Parson never comes to Church. The 
'Squire has made all his Tenants Atheists and Tithe- 
Stealers ; while the Parson instructs them every Sun- 
day in the Dignity of his Order, and insinuates to them 
in almost every Sermon, that he is a better Man than 
his Patron. In short, Matters are come to such an 
Extremity, that the 'Squire has not said his Prayers 
either in publick or private this half Year ; and that 
the Parson threatens him, if he does not mend his 
Manners, to pray for him in the Face of the whole 
Consfresation. 

Feuds of this Nature, though too frequent in the 
Countiy, are very fatal to the ordinary People ; who 
are so used to be dazzled with Riches, that they pay as 
much Deference to the Understandino; of a Man of an 
Estate, as of a Man of Learning ; and are very hardly 
brought to regard any Truth, how important soever it 
may be, that is preached to them, when they know 
there are several Men of five hundred a Year who do 
not believe it. 



I 



CHAPTER VIII. 

Sir Roger in Love. 
Harent infixi pectore vultus. Virg. 

IN my first Description of the Company in which 1 
pass most of my Time, it may be remembred that 
I mentioned a great Affliction which my Friend Sir 
Roger had met with in his Youth ; which was no less 
than a Disappointment in Love. It happened this 
Evening, that we fell into a very pleasing Walk at a 
Distance from his House : As soon as we came into 
it, ' It is,' quoth the good old Man, looking round him 
with a Smile, ' very hard, that any Part of my Land 
' should be settled upon one who has used me so ill as 
' the perverse Widow did ; and yet I am sure I could 
' not see a Sprig of any Bough of this whole Walk 
' of Trees, but I should reflect upon her and her Se- 
' verity. She has certainly the finest Hand of any 
' Woman in the World. You are to know this was 
' the Place wherein I used to muse upon her ; and by 
' that Custom I can never come into it, but the same 



54 SIR ROGER IN LOVE. 

' tender Sentiments revive in my Mind, as if I liad 
' actually walked with that beautiful Creature under 
' these Shades. I have been Fool enough to carve 
' her Name on the Bark of several of these Trees ; 
' so unhappy is the Condition of Men in Love, 
' to attempt the removing of their Passions by the 
' Methods which serve only to imprint it deeper. She 
' has certainly the finest Hand of any Woman in the 
' World.' 

Here followed a profound Silence ; and I was not 
displeased to observe my Friend falling so naturally 
into a Discourse, which I had ever before taken notice 
he industriously avoided. After a very long Pause he 
entered upon an Account of this great Circumstance 
in his Life, with an Air which I thought raised my 
Idea of him above what I had ever had before ; and 
gave me the Picture of that chearful Mind of his, be- 
fore it received that Stroke which has ever since affect- 
ed his Words and Actions. But he went on as follows. 

' I came to my Estate in my Twenty second Year, 
' and resolved to follow the Steps of the most worthy 
' of my Ancestors who have inhabited this Spot of 
' Earth before me, in all the Methods of Hospitality 
' and good Neighbourhood, for the sake of my Fame ; 
' and in Country Sports and Recreations, for the sake 
' of my Health. In my Twenty third Year I was 



SIR ROGER IN LOVE. OO 

obliged to serve as Sheriff of the County; and in 
my Servants, Officers and whole Equipage, indulged 
the Pleasure of a young Man (who did not think ill 
of his own Person) in taking that public Occasion of 
shewing my Figure and Behaviour to Advantage. 
You may easily imagine to yourself what Appear- 
ance I made, who am pretty tall, rid well, and was 
very well dressed, at the Head of a whole County, 
with Musick before me, a Feather in my Hat, and 
my Horse well bitted. I can assure you I was not a 
little pleased with the kind Looks and Glances I had 
from all the Balconies and Windows as I rode to the 
Hall where the Assizes were held. But when I 
came there, a beautiful Creature in a Widow's Plabit 
sat in Court, to hear the Event of a Cause concern- 
ing her Dower. This commanding Creature (who 
was born for Destruction of all who behold her) put 
on such a Resignation in her Countenance, and bore 
the Whispers of all around the Court, with such a 
pretty Uneasiness, I warrant you, and then recovered 
herself from one Eye to another, 'till she was per- 
fectly confused by meeting something so wistful in 
all she encountered, that at last, wnth a Murrain to 
her, she cast her bewitching Eye upon me. I no 
sooner met it, but I bowed like a great surprised 
Booby ; and knowing her Cause to be the first which 



56 SIR ROGER IN LOVE. 

' came on, I cried, like a captivated Calf as I was, 
' Make way for the Defendant's Witnesses. This sud- 
' den Partiality made all the County immediately see 
' the Sheriff also was become a Slave to the fine 
' Widow. During the Time her Cause was upon Trial, 
' she behaved herself, I warrant you, with such a deep 

* Attention to her Business, took Opportunities to have 
' little Billets handed to her Counsel, then would be in 
' such a pretty Confusion, occasioned, you must know, 
' by acting before so much Company, that not only I 
' but the whole Court was prejudiced in her Favour ; 
' and all that the next Heir to her Husband had to 
' urge, was thought so groundless and frivolous, that 
^ when it came to her Counsel to reply, there was not 
' half so much said as every one besides in the Court 
' thought he could have urged to her Advantage. You 
' must understand, Sir, this perverse Woman is one of 
' those unaccountable Creatures, that secretly rejoice 
' in the Admiration of Men, but indulge themselves in 

* no farther Consequences. Hence it is that she has 

' ever had a Train of Admirers, and she removes from | 
' her Slaves in Town to those in the Country, accord- i 
' ing to the Seasons of the Year. She is a reading 
' Lady, and far gone in the Pleasures of Friendship : 
' She is always accompanied by a Confident, who is ] 
' Witness to her daily Protestations against our Sex, 



SIR ROGER IN LOVE. 57 

' and consequently a Bar to her first Steps towards 
' Love, upon the Strength of her own Maxims and 
' Declarations. 

' However, I must needs say this accomplished 
' Mistress of mine has distinguished me above the rest, 
' and has been known to declare Sir Roger de Cov- 
' ERLEY was the tamest and most humane of all the 
' Brutes in the Country. I was told she said so by one 
' who thought he rallied me ; but upon the Strength 
' of this slender Encouragement of being thought least 
' detestable, I made new Liveries, new-paired my 
' Coach- Horses, sent them all to Town to be bitted, 
' and taught to throw their Legs well, and move all 
'together, before I pretended to cross the Country 
' and wait upon her. As soon as I thought my Reti- 
'nue suitable to the Character of my Fortune and 
'Youth, I set out from hence to make my Addresses. 
' The particular Skill of this Lady has ever been to 
' inflame your Wishes, and yet command Respect. 
' To make her Mistress of this Art, she has a greater 
' Share of Knowledge, Wit, and good Sense, than is 
' usual even among Men of Merit. Then she is beau- 
' tiful beyond the Race of Women. If you won't let 
' her go on with a certain Artifice with her Eyes, and 
' the Skill of Beauty, she will arm herself with her 
' real Charms, and strike you with Admiration. It is 



58 SIR ROGER IN LOVE. 

' certain that if you were to behold the whole Woman, 
' there is that Dignity in her Aspect, that Composure 
' in her Motion, that Complacency in her Manner, that 
' if her Form makes you hope, her Merit makes you 
' fear. But then again, she is such a desperate Scholar, 
' that no Country-Gentleman can approach her without 
' being a Jest. As I was going to tell you, when I 
' came to her House, I was admitted to her Presence 
' with great Civility ; at the same Time she placed 
' herself to be first seen by me in such an Attitude, 
' as I think you call the Posture of a Picture, that she 
' discovered new Charms, and I at last came towards 
' her with such an Awe as made me speechless. This 
' she no sooner observed but she made her Advantage 
' of it, and began a Discourse to me concerning Love 
' and Honour, as they both are followed by Pretenders, 
' and the real Votaries to them. When she discussed 
' these Points in a Discourse, which I verily believe 
' was as learned as the best Philosopher in Europe 
' could possibly make, she asked me whether she was 
' so happy as to fall in with my Sentiments on these 
' important Particulars. Her Confident sat by her, and 
' upon my being in the last Confusion and Silence, this 
' malicious Aid of hers turning to her says, I am very 
' glad to observe Sir Roger pauses upon this Subject, 
' and seems resolved to deliver all his Sentiments 



SIR ROGER IN LOVE. 59 

upon the Matter when he pleases to speak. They 
both kept their Countenances, and after I had sat half 
an Hour, meditating how to behave before such pro- 
found Casuists, I rose up and took my Leave. Chance 
has since that time thrown me very often in her 
Way, and she as often has directed a Discourse to 
me which I do not understand. This Barbarity has 
kept me ever at a Distance from the most beautiful 
Object my eyes ever beheld. It is thus also she 
deals with all Mankind, and you must make Love to 
her, as you would conquer the Sphinx, by posing her. 
But were she like other Women, and that there were 
any talking to her, how constant must the Pleasure 
of that Man be, who could converse with a Crea- 
ture But, after all, you may be sure her Heart 

is fixed on some one or other ; and yet I have been 
credibly informed ; but who can believe half that is 
said ! After she had done speaking to me, she put 
her Hand to her Bosom, and adjusted her Tucker. 
Then she cast her Eyes a little down, upon my 
beholding her too earnestly. They say she sings 
excellently : her Voice in her ordinary Speech has 
something in it inexpressibly sweet. You must know 
I dined with her at a public Table the Day after I 
first saw her, and she helped me to some Tansy in 
the Eye of all the Gentlemen in the Country : She 



60 SIR ROGER IN LOVE. 

' has certainly the finest Hand of any Woman in the 
' World. I can assure you, Sir, were you to behold 
' her, you would be in the same Condition ; for as her 
' Speech is Musick, her Form is Angelick. But I find 
' I grow irregular while I am talking of her ; but 
' indeed it would be Stupidity to be unconcerned at 
' such Perfection. Oh the excellent Creature ! she is 
' as inimitable to all Women, as she is inaccessible to 
' all Men.' 

I found my Friend began to rave, and insensibly led 
him towards the House, that we might be joined by 
some other Company ; and am convinced that the 
Widow is the secret Cause of all that Inconsistency 
which appears in some Parts of my Friend's Dis- 
course ; though he has so much Command of himself 
as not directly to mention her, yet according to that 
of Martial^ which one knows not how to render into 
English, Dum tacet hanc loquitur. I shall end this 
Paper with that whole Epigram, which represents with 
much Humour my honest Friend's Condition. 

Quicquid a git Riifics, nihil est, nisi NcBvia Rufo, 
Si gaudet, sijlet, si tacet, hanc loquitur : 

Cccnat, propiiiat, poscit, negat, annuit, una est 
NcBvia ; Si non sit Ncevia, mutus erit. 

Scriberet hesternd Patri ciim Luce Salutem, 
N(Evia luXf inquit, Navia numen, ave. 



SIR ROGER IN LOVE. 61 

Let Rufus weep, rejoice, stand, sit, or walk, 
Still he can nothing but of NcEvia talk ; 
Let him eat, drink, ask Questions, or dispute, 
Still he must speak of Nccvia, or be mute, 
He writ to his Father, ending with this Line, 
I am, my lovely Ncevia, ever thine. 



CHAPTER IX. 

The Coverley (Economy. 

JPaupertaiis fudor ^ fuga. Hor. 

rvECONOMY in our Affairs has the same Effect 
^ upon our Fortunes which Good-Breeding has upon 
our Conversations. There is a pretending Behaviour 
in both Cases, which, instead of making Men es- 
teemed, renders them both miserable and contempt- 
ible. We had Yesterday at Sir Roger's a Set of 
Country Gentlemen who dined with him : and after 
Dinner the Glass was taken, by those who pleased, 
pretty plentifully. Among others I observed a Person 
of a tolerable good Aspect, who seemed to be more 
greedy of Liquor than any of the Company, and yet, 
methought, he did not taste it with Delight. As he 
grew warm, he was suspicious of every thing that was 
said ; and as he advanced towards being fuddled, his 
Humour grew worse. At the same time his Bitter- 
ness seemed to be rather an inward Dissatisfaction in 
his own Mind, than any Dislike he had taken to the 



THE COVERLET (ECONOMY. 63 

Company. Upon hearing his Name, I knew him to 
be a Gentleman of a considerable Fortune in this 
County, but greatly in Debt. What gives the unhappy 
Man this Peevishness of Spirit, is, that his Estate is 
dipped, and is eating out with Usury ; and yet he 
has not the Heart to sell any part of it. His proud 
Stomach, at the Cost of restless Nights, constant 
Inquietudes, Danger of Affronts, and a thousand 
nameless Inconveniences, preserves this Canker in 
his Fortune, rather than it shall be said he is a Man 
of fewer Hundreds a Year than he has been com- 
monly reputed. Thus he endures the Torment of 
Poverty, to avoid the Name of being less rich. If you 
go to his House you see great Plenty ; but served in a 
Manner that shows it is all unnatural, and that the 
Master's Mind is not at Home. There is a certain 
Waste and Carelessness in the Air of every thing, and 
the Whole appears but a covered Indigence, a mag- 
nificent Poverty. That Neatness and Chearfulness 
which attends the Table of him who lives within 
Compass, is wanting, and exchanged for a Libertine 
Way of Service in all about him. 

This Gentleman's Conduct, though a very common 
way of Management, is as ridiculous as that Officer's 
would be, who had but few Men under his Command, 
and should take the Charge of an Extent of Country 



64 THE COVERLET (ECONOMY. 

rather than of a small Pass. To pay for, personate, 
and keep in a Man's Hands a greater Estate than he 
really has, is of all others the most unpardonable 
Vanity, and must in the End reduce the Man who is 
guilty of it to Dishonour. Yet if we look round us in 
any County of Great Britain^ we shall see many in 
this fatal Error ; if that may be called by so soft a 
Name, which proceeds from a false Shame of appear- 
ing what they really are, when the contrary Behaviour 
would in a short time advance them to the Condition 
which they pretend to. 

Laertes has fifteen hundred Pounds a Year ; which 
is mortgaored for six thousand Pounds : but it is im- 
possible to convince him that if he sold as much as 
would pay off that Debt, he would save four Shillings 
in the Pound, which he gives for the Vanity of being 
the reputed Master of it. Yet if Laertes did this, he 
would perhaps be easier in his own Fortune ; but 
then Irus^ a Fellow of Yesterday, who has but twelve 
hundred a Year, would be his Equal. Rather than 
this shall be, Laertes goes on to bring well-born Beg- 
gars into the World, and every Twelvemonth charges 
his Estate with at least one Year's Rent more by the 
Birth of a Child. 

Laertes and Irus are Neighbours, whose Way of 
living are an Abomination to each other. Irus is 



THE COVERLET (ECONOMY. 65 

moved by the Fear of Poverty, and Laertes by the 
Shame of it. Though the Motive of Action is of so 
near Affinity in both, and may be resolved into this, 
* That to each of them Poverty is the greatest of 
' Evils,' yet are their Manners very widely different. 
Shame of Poverty makes Laertes lanch into unneces- 
sary Equipage, vain Expence, and lavish Entertain- 
ments ; Fear of Poverty makes Irus allow himself 
only plain Necessaries, appear without a Servant, sell 
his own Corn, attend his Labourers, and be himself a 
Labourer. Shame of Poverty makes Laertes go every 
Day a Step nearer to it, and Fear of Poverty stirs 
up Irus to make every Day some further Progress 
from it. 

These different Motives produce the Excesses which 
Men are guilty of, in the Negligence of and Provision 
for themselves. Usury, Stock-jobbing, Extortion, and 
Oppression, have their Seed in the Dread of Want ; 
and Vanity, Riot, and Prodigality, from the Shame 
of it : But both these Excesses are infinitely below 
the Pursuit of a reasonable Creature. After we have 
taken Care to command so much as is necessary for 
maintaining ourselves in the Order of Men suitable to 
our Character, the Care of Superfluities is a Vice no 
less extravagant, than the Neglect of Necessaries 
would have been before. 
5 



66 THE COVERLEY (ECONOMY. 

It would methinks be no ill Maxim of Life, if ac- 
cording to that Ancestor of Sir Roger, whom I lately 
mentioned, every Man would point to himself what 
Sum he would resolve not to exceed. He might by 
this Means cheat himself into a Tranquillity on this 
Side of that Expectation, or convert what he should 
get above it to nobler Uses than his own Pleasures or 
Necessities. 

It is possible that the Tranquillity I now enjoy at 
Sir Roger's may have created in me this way of 
thinking, which is so abstracted from the common 
Relish of the World : But as I am now in a pleasing 
Arbour, surrounded with a beautiful Landscape, I find 
no Inclination so strong as to continue in these Man- 
sions, so remote from the ostentatious Scenes of Life ; 
and am at this present Writing Philosopher enough to 
conclude with Mr. Cowley, 

If e'er Ambition did my Fancy cheat, 
With any Wish so mean as to be Great ; 
Continue, Heaven, still from me to remove 
The Humble Blessings of that Life I love ! 



CHAPTER X. 

■ The Coverley Hunt. 
Ut sit Mens sana in Corpore sano. Juv. 

TTAD not Exercise been absolutely necessary for 
-^-^ our Well-being, Nature would not have made 
the Body so proper for it, by giving such an Activity 
to the Limbs, and such a Pliancy to every Part as 
necessarily produce those Compressions, Extensions, 
Contortions, Dilatations, and all other kinds of Motions 
that are necessary for the preservation of such a Sys- 
tem of Tubes and Glands as has been before men- 
tioned. And that we might not want Inducements to 
engage us in such an Exercise of the Body as is 
proper for its Welfare, it is so ordered that nothing 
valuable can be procured without it. Not to mention 
Riches and Honour, even Food and Raiment are not 
to be come at without the Toil of the Hands and 
Sweat of the Brows. Providence furnishes Materials, 
but expects that we should work them up our selves. 
The Earth must be laboured before it gives its In- 



68 THE COVERLET HUNT. 

% 

crease, and when it is forced into its several Products, 
how many Hands must they pass through before they 
are fit for Use ? Manufactures, Trade, and Agricul- 
ture, naturally employ more than nineteen Parts of 
the Species in twenty ; and as for those who are not 
obliged to labour, by the Condition in which they are 
born, they are more miserable than the rest of Man- 
kind, unless they indulge themselves in that voluntary 
Labour which goes by the Name of Exercise. 

My Friend Sir Roger has been an indefatigable 
Man in Business of this kind, and has hung several 
Parts of his House with the Trophies of his former 
Labours. The Walls of his great Hall are covered 
with the Horns of several kinds of Deer that he has 
killed in the Chace, which he thinks the most valuable 
Furniture of his House, as they afford him frequent 
Topicks of Discourse, and show that he has not been 
idle. At the lower End of the Hall is a large Otter's 
Skin stuffed with Hay, which his Mother ordered to 
be hung up in that manner, and the Knight looks upon 
with great Satisfaction, because it seems he was but 
nine Years old when his Dog killed him. A little 
Room adjoining to the Hall is a kind of Arsenal filled 
with Guns of several Sizes and Inventions, with which 
the Knight has made great Havock in the Woods, and 
destroyed many thousands of Pheasants, Partridges 



THE COVERLEY HUNT. 69 

and Woodcocks. His Stable Doors are patched with 
Noses that belonged to Foxes of the Knight's own 
hunting down. Sir Roger showed me one of them 
that for Distinction sake has a Brass Nail struck 
through it, which cost him about fifteen Hours' riding, 
carried him through half a Dozen Counties, killed 
him a Brace of Geldings, and lost above half his 
Dogs. This the Knight looks upon as one of the 
greatest Exploits of his Life. The perverse Widow, 
whom I have given some Account of, was the Death 
of several Foxes ; for Sir Roger has told me that in 
the Course of his Amours he patched the Western 
Door of his Stable. Whenever the Widow was cruel, 
the Foxes were sure to pay for it. In Proportion as 
his Passion for the Widow abated and old Age came 
on, he left off Fox-hunting; but a Hare is not yet 
safe that sits within ten Miles of his House. 

After what has been said, I need not inform my 
Readers, that Sir Roger, with whose Character I hope 
they are at present pretty well acquainted, has in his 
Youth gone through the whole Course of those rural 
Diversions which the Country abounds in ; and which 
seem to be extremely well suited to that laborious 
Industry a Man may observe here in a far greater 
Degree than in Towns and Cities. I have before 
hinted at some of my Friend's Exploits : He has in 



70 THE COVERLET HUNT. 

his youthful Days taken forty Coveys of Partridges 
in a Season ; and tired many a Salmon with a 
Line consisting but of a single Hair. The constant 
Thanks and good Wishes of the Neighbourhood al- 
ways attended him, on account of his remarkable 
Enmity towards Foxes ; having destroyed more of 
those Vermin in one Year, than it was thought the 
whole Country could have produced. Indeed the 
Knight does not scruple to own among his most inti- 
mate Friends, that in order to establish his Reputation 
this Way, he has secretly sent for great Numbers of 
them out of other Countries, which he used to turn 
loose about the Country by Night, that he might the 
better signalize himself in their Destruction the next 
Day. His Hunting-Horses were the finest and best 
managed in all these Parts : His Tenants are still full 
of the Praises of a gray Stone-horse that unhappily 
staked himself several Years since, and was buried 
with great Solemnity in the Orchard. 

Sir Roger, being at present too old for Fox-hunt- 
ing, to keep himself in Action has disposed of his 
Beagles and got a Pack of Stop-hounds. What these j» 
want in Speed, he endeavours to make amends for 
by the Deepness of their Mouths and the Variety of 
their Notes, which are suited in such manner to each | 
other, that the whole Cry makes up a complete Con- 



THE COVERLET HUNT. 71 

sort. He is so nice in this Particular, that a Gentle- 
man having made him a Present of a very fine Hound 
the other Day, the Knight returned it by the Servant 
with a great many expressions of Civility ; but desired 
him to tell his Master, that the Dog he had sent was 
indeed a most excellent Bass, but that at present he 
only wanted a Coimter- Tenor. Could I believe my 
Friend had ever read Shakespeare, I should certainly 
conclude he had taken the Hint from Theseus in the 
Midsummer Nighfs Dream. 

My Hounds are bred out of the Spartan Kind, 
So jlu'd, so sanded ; and their Heads are hung 
With Ears that sweep arvay the Morning Dew. 
Crook-kneed and dew-lap^ d like Thessalian Bulls. 
Slow in Pursuit, but matched in Mouths like Bells, 
Each under each : A Cry more tuneable 
Was never hollowed to, nor chear''d with Horn. 

Sir Roger is so keen at this Sport, that he has 
been out almost every Day since I came down ; and 
upon the Chaplain's offering to lend me his easy Pad, 
I was prevailed on Yesterday Morning to make one 
of the Company. I was extremely pleased, as we 
rid along, to observe the general Benevolence of all 
the Neighbourhood towards my Friend. The Farmers' 
Sons thought themselves happy if they could open 
a' Gate for the good old Knight as he passed by ; 
which he generally requited with a Nod or a Smile, 
and a kind Inquiry after their Fathers and Uncles. 



72 THE COVERLET HUNT. 

After we had rid about a Mile from Home, we 
came upon a large Heath, and the Sportsmen began 
to beat. They had done so for some time, when, as I 
was at a little Distance from the rest of the Company, 
I saw a Hare pop out from a small Furze-brake almost 
under my Horse's Feet. I marked the Way she took, 
which I endeavoured to make the Company sensible of 
by extending my Arm ; but to no purpose, 'till Sir 
Roger, who knows that none of my extraordinary 
Motions are insignificant, rode up to me, and asked 
me if Puss was gone that Way ? Upon my answer- 
ing Yes, he immediately called in the Dogs, and put 
them upon the Scent. As they were going off, I 
heard one of the Country-Fellows muttering to his 
Companion, That "'twas a Wonder they had not lost 
all their Sport, for loant of the silent Gentleman'' s 
crying STOLE AWAY. 

This, with my Aversion to leaping Hedges, made 
me withdraw to a rising Ground, from whence I could 
have the Pleasure of the whole Chace, without the 
Fatigue of keeping in with the Hounds, The Hare 
immediately threw them above a Mile behind her ; 
but I was pleased to find, that instead of running 
straight forwards, or in Hunter's Language, Flying 
the Country, as I was afraid she might have done, she 
wheeled about, and described a sort of Circle round 



THE COVERLET HUNT. 73 

the Hill where I had taken my Station, in such 
Manner as gave me a very distinct View of the Sport. 
I could see her first pass by, and the Dogs sometime 
afterwards unravelling the whole Track she had made, 
and following her through all her Doubles. I was at 
the same Time delighted in observing that Deference 
which the rest of the Pack paid to each particular 
Hound, according to the Character he had acquired 
amongst them : If they were at a Fault, and an old 
Hound of Reputation opened but once, he was imme- 
diately followed by the whole Cry ; while a raw Dog, 
or one who was a noted Liar, might have yelped his 
Heart out, without being taken notice of. 

The Hare now, after having squatted two or three 
times, and been put up again as often, came still nearer 
to the Place where she was at first started. The Dogs 
pursued her, and these were followed by the jolly 
Knight, who rode upon a white Gelding, encompassed 
by his Tenants and Servants, and chearing his Hounds 
with all the Gaiety of Five and Twenty. One of the 
Sportsmen rode up to me, and told me, that he was 
sure the Chace was almost at an end, because the old 
Dogs, which had hitherto lain behind, now headed the 
Pack. The Fellow was in the Right. Our Hare 
took a large Field just under us, followed by the full 
Cry in View. I must confess the Brightness of the 



74 THE COVERLET HUNT. 

Weather, the Chearfulness of every thing around me, 
the Chiding of the Hounds, which was returned upon 
us in a double Echo from two neighbouring Hills, 
with the Hollowing of the Sportsmen, and the Sound- 
ing of the Horn, lifted my Spirits into a most lively 
Pleasure, which I freely indulged because I was sure 
it was innocent. If I was under any Concern, it was 
on the account of the poor Hare, that was now quite 
spent, and almost within the reach of her Enemies ; 
when the Huntsman getting forward, threw down his 
Pole before the Dogs. They were now within eight 
Yards of that Game which they had been pursuing for 
almost as many Hours ; yet on the Signal before- 
mentioned they all made a sudden Stand, and though 
they continued opening as much as before, durst not 
once attempt to pass beyond the Pole. At the same 
time Sir Roger rode forward, and alighting, took up 
the Hare in his Arms ; which he soon delivered up to 
one of his Servants with an Order, if she could be 
kept alive, to let her go in his great Orchard ; where 
it seems he has several of these Prisoners of War, 
who live together in a very comfortable Captivity. I 
was highly pleased to see the Discipline of the Pack, 
and the Good-nature of the Knight, who could not find 
in his Heart to murder a Creature that had given him 
so much Diversion. 



THE COVERLET HUNT. 75 

For my own part I intend to hunt twice a Week 
during my Stay with Sir Roger ; and shall prescribe 
the moderate Use of this Exercise to ali my Country 
Friends, as the best kind of Physick for mending a 
bad Constitution, and preserving a good one. 

I cannot do this better, than in the following Lines 
out of Mr. Bryden. 

The first Physicians by Debauch were made ; 
Excess began, and Sloth sustains the Trade. 
By Chace our long-lived Fathers earned their Food ; 
Toil strung the Nerves, and purify'' d the Blood ; 
But we their Sons, a pampered Race of Men, 
Are dwindled down to threescore Years and ten. 
Better to hunt in Fields for Health unbought, 
Than see the Doctor for a nauseous Draught, 
The Wise for Cure on Exercise depend : 
God never made his Work for Man to mend. 



CHAPTER XI. 

The Coverley Witch. 

Ipsi sibi sovmiafingunt. Virg. 

rpHERE are some Opinions in which a Man should 
-*- stand Neuter, without engaging his Assent to one 
side or the other. Such a hovering Faith as this, 
which refuses to settle upon any Determination, is 
absolutely necessary in a Mind that is careful to avoid 
Errors and Prepossessions. When the Arguments 
press equally on both sides in Matters that are indif- 
ferent to us, the safest Method is to give up ourselves 
to neither. 

It is with this Temper of Mind that I consider the 
Subject of Witchcraft. When I hear the Relations 
that are made from all Parts of the World, not only 
from Norway and Lapland^ from the East and West 
Indies^ but from every particular Nation in Europe^ 
I cannot forbear thinking that there is such an Inter- 
course and Commerce with Evil Spirits, as that which 
we express by the Name of Witchcraft. But when 



THE COVERLET WITCH. 77 

I consider that the ignorant and credulous Parts of 
the World abound most in these Relations, and that 
the Persons among us, who are supposed to engage 
in such an infernal Commerce, are People of a weak 
Understanding and crazed Imagination, and at the 
same time reflect upon the many Impostures and 
Delusions of this Nature that have been detected in 
all Ages, I endeavour to suspend my Belief till I hear 
more certain Accounts than any which have yet come 
to my Knowledge. In short, when I consider the 
Question, whether there are such Persons in the 
World as those we call Witches, my mind is divided 
between the two opposite Opinions ; or rather (to 
speak my Thoughts freely) I believe in general that 
there is, and has been such a thing as Witchcraft ; 
but at the same time can give no Credit to any par- 
ticular Instance of it. 

I am engaged in this Speculation, by some Occur- 
rences that I met with Yesterday, which I shall give 
my Reader an Account of at large. As I was walk- 
ing with my Friend Sir Roger by the side of one of 
his Woods, an old Woman applied herself to me for 
my Charity. Her Dress and Figure put me in mind 
of the following Description in Otway. 

In a dose Lane as I pursued my Journey, 
I spjfd a rvrinkled Hag, rvith Age grorvn double, 



78 THE COVERLEY WITCH. 

Picking dry Sticks, and mumbling to herself. 

Her Eyes with scalding Rheum were galVd and red ; 

Cold Palsy shook her Head ; her Hands seemed withered ; 

And on her crooked Shoulders had she wrapped 

The tattered Remnayits of an old striped Hanging, 

Which served to keep her Carcase from the Cold: 

So there was nothing of a Piece about her. 

Her lower Weeds were all o'er coarsely patch'' d 

With diffWent coloured Rags, black, red, white, yellow, 

And seemed to speak Variety of Wretchedness. 

As I was musing on this Description, and com- 
paring it with the Object before me, the Knight told 
me, that this very old Woman had the Reputation of 
a Witch all over the Country, that her Lips were 
observed to be always in Motion, and that there was 
not a Switch about her House which her Neighbours 
did not believe had carried her several hundreds of 
Miles. If she chanced to stumble, they always found 
Sticks or Straws that lay in the Figure of a Cross 
before her. If she made any Mistake at Church, 
and cryed Amen in a wrong Place, they never failed 
to conclude that she was saying her Prayers back- 
wards. There was not a Maid in the Parish that 
would take a Pin of her, though she should offer a 
Bag of Money with it. She goes by the Name of 
Moll White, and has made the Country ring with 
several imaginaiy Exploits which are palmed upon 
her. If the Dairy-maid does not make her Butter 



4 



THE COVERLET WITCH. 79 

come so soon as she should have it, Moll White is at 
the Bottom of the Churn. If a Horse sweats in the 
Stable, Moll White has been upon his Back. If a 
Hare makes an unexpected Escape from the Hounds, 
the Huntsman curses Moll White. Nay, (says Sir 
Roger) I have known the Master of the Pack upon 
such an Occasion, send one of his Servants to see 
if Moll White has been out that Morning. 

This Account raised my curiosity so far, that I 
begged my Friend Sir Roger to go with me into her 
Hovel, which stood in a solitary Corner under the 
side of the Wood. Upon our first entering Sir Roger 
winked to me, and pointed at something that stood 
behind the Door, which, upon looking that VVay, I 
found to be an old Broom-staff. At the same time 
he whispered me in the Ear to take notice of a Tabby 
Cat that sat in the Chimney-Corner, which, as the 
old Knight told me, lay under as bad a Report as 
Moll White herself ; for besides that, Moll is said 
often to accompany her in the same Shape, the Cat 
is reported to have spoken twice or thrice in her Life, 
and to have played several Pranks above the Capacity 
of an ordinary Cat. 

I was secretly concerned to see human Nature in 
so much Wretchedness and Disgrace, but at the same 
time could not forbear smiling to hear Sir Roger, who 



80 THE COVERLET WITCH. 

is a little puzzled about the old Woman, advising her 
as a Justice of Peace to avoid all Communication with 
the Devil, and never to hurt any of her Neighbour's 
Cattle. We concluded our Visit with a Bounty, which 
was very acceptable. 

In our Return home, Sir Roger told me, that old 
Moll had been often brought before him for making 
Children spit Pins, and giving Maids the Night-Mare ; 
and that the Country People would be tossing her into 
a Pond and trying Experiments with her every Day, 
if it was not for him and his Chaplain. 

I have since found upon Inquiry, that Sir Roger 
was several times staggered with the Reports that 
had been brought him concerning this old Woman, 
and would frequently have bound her over to the 
County Sessions, had not his Chaplain, with much 
ado, persuaded him to the contrary. 

I have been the more particular in this Account, 
because I hear there is scarce a Village in England 
that has not a Moll White in it. When an old 
Woman begins to dote, and grow chargeable to a 
Parish, she is generally turned into a Witch, and fills 
the whole Country with extravagant Fancies, imagi- 
nary Distempers and terrifying Dreams. In the mean 
time, the poor Wretch that is the innocent Occasion 
of so many Evils, begins to be frighted at herself. 



THE COVERLET WITCH. 81 

and sometimes confesses secret Commerce and Fami- 
liarities that her Imagination forms in a delirious old 
Age. This frequently cuts off Charity from the 
greatest Objects of Compassion, and inspires People 
with a Malevolence towards those poor decrepid Parts 
of our Species, in whom human Nature is defaced by 
Infirmity and Dotage. 



CHAPTER XII. 

A CovERLEY Love Match. 
Hcsret lateri lethalis arundo. Virg. 

n^HIS agreeable Seat is surrounded with so many 
-*- pleasing Walks which are struck out of a Wood 
in the midst of which the House stands, that one can 
hardly ever be weary of rambling from one labyrinth 
of Delight to another. To one used to live in a City 
the Charms of the Country are so exquisite, that the 
Mind is lost in a certain Transport which raises us 
above ordinary Life, and is yet not strong enough to 
be inconsistent with Tranquillity. This State of Mind 
was I in, ravished with the Murmur of Waters, the 
Whisper of Breezes, the Singing of Birds ; and whe- 
ther I looked up to the Heavens, down on the Earth, 
or turned on the Prospects around me, still struck 
with new Sense of Pleasure ; when I found by the 
Voice of my Friend, who walked by me, that we had 
insensibly strolled into the Grove sacred to the Widow. 
This Woman, says he, is of all others the most unin- 



A COVERLET LOVE MATCH. 83 

telligible ; she either designs to marry, or she does 
not. What is the most perplexing of all, is, that she 
doth not either say to her Lovers she has any Resolu- 
tion against that Condition of Life in general, or that 
she banishes them ; but conscious of her own Merit, 
she permits their Addresses without fear of any ill 
Consequence, or want of Respect, from their Rage or 
Despair. She has that in her Aspect, against which it 
is impossible to offend. A Man whose Thoughts are 
constantly built upon so agreeable an Object, must be 
excused if the ordinary Occurrences in Conversation 
are below his Attention. I call her indeed perverse, 
but, alas ! why do I call her so ? Because her supe- 
rior Merit is such, that I cannot approach her without 
Awe, that my Heart is checked by too much Esteem : 
I am angry that her Charms are not more accessible, 
that I am more inclined to worship than salute her: 
How often have I wished her unhappy that I might 
have an Opportunity of serving her ? and how often 
troubled in that very Imagination, at giving her the 
Pain of being obliged ? Well, I have led a miserable 
Life in secret upon her Account ; but fancy she would 
have condescended to have some regard to me, if it 
had not been for that watchful Animal her Confi- 
dant. 

Of all Persons under the Sun (continued he, calling 



84 A COVERLET LOVE MATCH. 

me by my Name) be sure to set a Mark upon Confidants : 
they are of all People the most impertinent. What is 
most pleasant to observe in them, is, that they assume 
to themselves the Merit of the Persons whom they 
have in their Custody. Orestilla is a great Fortune, 
and in wonderful Danger of Surprises, therefore full 
of Suspicions of the least indifferent thing, particu- 
larly careful of new Acquaintance, and of growing 
too familiar with the old. Themista, her favourite- 
Woman, is every whit as careful of whom she speaks 
to, and what she says. Let the AVard be a Beauty, 
her Confidant shall treat you with an Air of Distance ; 
let her be a Fortune, and she assumes the suspicious 
Behaviour of her Friend and Patroness. Thus it is 
that very many of our unmarried Women of Distinc- 
tion are to all Intents and Purposes married, except 
the Consideration of different Sexes. They are di- 
rectly under the Conduct of their Whisperer ; and 
think they are in a State of Freedom, while they can 
prate with one of these Attendants of all Men in 
general, and still avoid the Man they most like. You 
do not see one Heiress in a hundred whose Fate does 
not turn upon this Circumstance of Choosing a Confi- 
dant. Thus it is that the Lady is addressed to, pre- 
sented and flattered, only by Proxy, in her Woman. 
In my case, how is it possible that 



A COVERLEY LOVE MATCH. 85 

Sir Roger was proceeding in his Harangue, when 
we lieard the Voice of one speaking very importu- 
nately, and repeating these Words, ' What, not one 
' Smile ? ' We followed the Sound till we came to a 
close Thicket, on the other side of which we saw a 
young W^oman sitting as it were in a personated Sul- 
lenness just over a transparent Fountain. Opposite 
to her stood Mr. William^ Sir Roger's Master of the 
Game. The Knight whispered me, ' Hist, these are 
' Lovers.' The Huntsman looking earnestly at the 
Shadow of the young Maiden in the Stream, ' Oh 
' thou dear Picture, if thou couldst remain there in the 
' Absence of that fair Creature, whom you represent 
' in the Water, how willingly could I stand here satis- 
' fied for ever, without troubling my dear Betty her- 
' self with any Mention of her unfortunate William, 
' whom she is angry with : But alas ! when she pleases 

' to be gone, thou wilt also vanish Yet let me 

' talk to thee while thou dost stay. Tell my dearest 
' Betty thou dost not more depend upon her, than does 
' her William : Her Absence will make away with 
' me as well as thee. If she offers to remove thee, 
' I'll jump into these Waves to lay hold on thee ; her- 
' self, her own dear Person, I must never embrace 

'again. Still do you hear me without one Smile 

' It is too much to bear ' He had no sooner 



86 A COVERLEY LOVE MATCH. 

spoke these Words but he made an offer of throwing 
himself into the Water : At which his Mistress started 
up, and at the next Instant he jumped across the 
Fountain and met her in an Embrace. She half re- 
covering from her Fright, said in the most charming 
Voice imaginable, and with a Tone of Complaint, 
' I thought how well you would drown yourself. No, 
' no, you won't drown yourself till you have taken 
' your leave of Susan Holiday.^ The Huntsman, with 
a Tenderness that spoke the most passionate Love, 
and with his Cheek close to hers, whispered the softest 
Vows of Fidelity in her Ear, and cryed, ' Don't, my 
' Dear, believe a Word Kate Willow says ; she is 
' spiteful and makes Stories, because she loves to hear 
' me talk to herself for your sake.' 

Look you there, quoth Sir Roger, do you see there, 
all Mischief comes from Confidants ! But let us not 
interrupt them ; the Maid is honest, and the Man dares 
not be otherwise, for he knows I loved her Father : I 
will interpose in this Matter, and hasten the Wedding. 
Kate Willow is a witty and mischievous Wench in the 
Neighbourhood, who was a Beauty ; and makes me 
hope I shall see the perverse Widow in her Condition. 
She was so flippant with her Answers to all the honest 
Fellows that came near her, and so very vain of her 
Beauty, that she has valued herself upon her Charms 



A COVERLEY LOVE MATCH. 87 

till they are ceased. She therefore now makes it her 
Business to prevent other young Women from being 
more Discreet than she was herself: However, the 
saucy thing said the other Day well enough, ' Sir 
* Roger and I must make a Match, for we are both 
' despised by those we loved : ' The Hussy has a 
great deal of Power wherever she comes, and has 
her Share of Cunning. 

However, when I reflect upon this Woman, I do not 
know whether in the main I am the worse for having 
loved her : Whenever she is recalled to my Imagina- 
tion my Youth returns, and I feel a forgotten Warmth 
in my Veins. This Affliction in my Life has streaked 
all my Conduct with a Softness, of which I should 
otherwise have been incapable. It is, perhaps, to this 
dear Image in my Heart owing, that I am apt to 
relent, that I easily forgive, and that many desirable 
Things are grown into my Temper, which I should 
not have arrived at by better Motives than the Thought 
of being one Day hers. I am pretty well satisfied 
such a Passion as I have had is never well cured ; and 
between you and me, I am often apt to imagine it has 
had some whimsical Effect upon my Brain : For I 
frequently find, that in my most serious Discourse I 
let fall some comical Familiarity of Speech or odd 
Phrase that makes the Company Laugh ; However, I 



88 A COVERLEY LOVE MATCH. 

cannot but allow she is a most excellent Woman. 
When she is in the Country I warrant she does not run 
into Dairies, but reads upon the Nature of Plants ; but 
has a Glass Hive, and comes into the Garden out of 
Books to see them work, and observe the Policies of 
their Commonwealth. She understands every thing. 
Fd give ten Pounds to hear her argue with my Friend 
Sir Andrew Freeport about Trade. No, no, for all 
she looks so innocent as it were, take my Word for it 
she is no Fool. 



CHAPTER XIII. 

The Coverley Etiquette. 

Urhem quavi dicunt Romam, Melibcee, putavi 
SttiUus ego huic nostra similem. Virg. 

n^HE first and most obvious Reflexions which arise 
-*- in a Man who changes the City for the Country, 
are upon the different Manners of the People whom he 
meets with in those two different Scenes of Life. By 
Manners I do not mean Morals, but Behaviour ond 
Good-breeding as they show themselves in the Town 
and in the Country. 

And here, in the first place, I must observe a very 
great Revolution that has happened in this Article of 
Good-breeding. Several obliging Deferences, Conde- 
scensions and Submissions, with many outward Forms 
and Ceremonies that accompany them, were first of 
all brought up among the politer Part of Mankind, 
who lived in Courts and Cities, and distinguished 
themselves from the Rustick part of the Species (who 
on all Occasions acted bluntly and naturally) by such 



90 THE COVERLET ETIQUETTE. 

a mutual Complaisance and Intercourse of Civilities. 
These Forms of Conversation by degrees multiplied 
and grew troublesome ; the modish World found too 
great a Constraint in them, and have therefore thrown 
most of them aside. Conversation, like the Rornish 
Religion, was so encumbered with Show and Cere- 
mony, that it stood in need of a Reformation to re- 
trench its Superfluities, and restore it to its natural 
good Sense and Beauty. At present therefore an 
unconstrained Carriage, and a certain openness of 
Behaviour, are the height of Good-breeding. The 
fashionable World is grown free and easy ; our Man- 
ners sit more loose upon us : Nothing is so modish as 
an agreeable Negligence. In a word. Good-breeding 
shews itself most, where to an ordinary Eye it appears 
the least. 

If after this we look on the People of Mode in the 
Country, we find in them the Manners of the last Age. 
They have no sooner fetched themselves up to the 
Fashion of the polite World, but the Town has drop- 
ped them, and are nearer to the first State of Nature, 
than to those Refinements which formerly reigned in 
the Court, and still prevail in the Country. One may 
now know a Man that never conversed in the World, 
by his Excess of Good-breeding. A polite Country 
'Squire shall make you as many bows in half an 



THE COVERLEY ETIQUETTE. 91 

Hour, as would serve a Courtier for a Week. There 
is infinitely more to do about Place and Precedency 
in a Meeting of Justices' Wives, than in an Assembly 
of Dutchesses. 

This Rural Politeness is very troublesome to a Man 
of my Temper, who generally take the Chair that is 
next me, and walk first or last, in the Front or in the 
Rear, as Chance directs. I have known my Friend 
Sir Roger's Dinner almost cold, before the Company 
could adjust the Ceremonial, and be prevailed to sit 
down ; and have heartily pitied my old Friend, when 
I have seen him forced to pick and cull his Guests, 
as they sat at the several Parts of his Table, that he 
might drink their Healths according to their respective 
Ranks and Qualities. Honest Will Wiinhle, who I 
should have thought had been altogether uninfected 
with Ceremony, gives me abundance of Trouble in 
this Particular. Though he has been fishing all the 
Morning, he will not help himself at Dinner 'till I am 
served. When we are going out of the Hall, he runs 
behind me ; and last Night, as we were walking in 
the Fields, stopped short at a Stile 'till I came up to it, 
and upon my making Signs to him to get over, told 
me, with a serious Smile, that sure I believed they had 
no Manners in the Country. 

There has happened another Revolution in the Point 



92 THE COVERLET ETIQUETTE. 

of Good-breeding, which relates to the Conversation 
anaong Men of Mode, and which I cannot but look 
upon as very extraordinary. It was certainly one of 
the first Distinctions of a well-bred Man, to express 
every thing that had the most remote Appearance of 
being obscene, in modest Terms and distant Phrases ; 
whilst the Clown, who had no such Delicacy of 
Conception and Expression, clothed his Ideas in those 
plain homely Terms that are the most obvious and 
natural. This kind of Good-manners was perhaps 
carried to an Excess, so as to make Conversation too 
stiff, formal and precise : for which Reason (as 
Hypocrisy in one Age is generally succeeded by 
Atheism in another) Conversation is in a great 
measure relapsed into the first Extreme ; so that at 
present several of our Men of the Town, and par- 
ticularly those who have been polished in France^ 
make use of the most coarse uncivilized Words in our 
Language, and utter themselves often in such a 
manner as a Clown would blush to hear. 

This infamous Piece of Good-breeding, which reigns 
among the Coxcombs of the Town, has not yet made 
its way into the Country ; and as it is impossible for 
such an irrational way of Conversation to last long 
among a People that make any Profession of Religion, 
or Show of Modesty, if the Country Gentlemen get 



THE COVERLEY ETIQUETTE. 93 

into it they will certainly be left in the lurch. Their 
Good-breeding will come too late to them, and they 
will be thought a Parcel of lewd Clowns, while they 
fancy themselves talking together like Men of Wit and 
Pleasure. 

As the two Points of Good-breeding which I have 
hitherto insisted upon, regard Behaviour and Con- 
versation, there is a third which turns upon Dress. In 
this too the Country are very much behind-hand. 
The Rural Beaus are not yet got out of the fashion 
that took place at the time of the Revolution, but ride 
about the Country in red Coats and laced Hats, while 
the Women in many Parts are still trying to outvie 
one another in the Heio-ht of their Head-dresses. 



CHAPTER XIY. 

The Coverley Ducks. 

Equidem credo, quia sit Divinitus illis 
Ingenium. Virg. 

"|\ /TY Friend Sir Roger is very often merry with me 
upon my passing so much of my time among his 
Poultry. He has caught me twice or thrice looking 
after a Bird's Nest, and several times sitting an Hour 
or two together near an Hen and Chickens. He tells 
me he believes I am personally acquainted with every 
Fowl about his House ; calls such a Cock my Fa- 
vourite, and frequently complains that his Ducks and 
Geese have more of my Company than himself. 

I must confess I am infinitely delighted with those 
Speculations of Nature which are to be made in a 
Country-Life ; and as my Reading has very much lain 
among Books of Natural History, I cannot forbear 
recollecting upon this Occasion the several Remarks 
which I have met with in Authors, and comparing 
them with what falls under my own Observation : 



THE COVERLET DUCKS. 95 

The Arguments for Providence drawn from the 
natural History of Animals being in my Opinion 
demonstrative. 

It is astonishing to consider the different Degrees of 
Care that descend from the Parent to the Young, so 
far as is absolutely necessary for the leaving a 
Posterity. Some Creatures cast their Eggs as Chance 
directs them, and think of them no farther, as Insects 
and several Kinds of Fish ; others of a nicer Frame, 
find out proper Beds to deposit them in, and there 
leave them ; as the Serpent, the Crocodile and the 
Ostrich : Others hatch their Eggs and tend the Birth, 
'till it is able to shift for itself. 

What can we call the Principle which directs every 
different kind of Bird to observe a particular Plan in 
the Structure of its Nest, and direct all the same 
Species to work after the same Model ? It cannot be 
Imitation ; for though you hatch a Crow under a Hen, 
and never let it see any of the Works of its own Kind, 
the Nest it makes shall be the same to the laying of a 
Stick, with all the other Nests of the same Species. 
It cannot be Reason ; for were Animals indued with 
it to as great a Degree as Man, their Buildings would 
be as different as ours, according to the different 
Conveniences that they would propose to themselves. 

Is it not remarkable, that the same Temper of 



96 THE COVERLET DUCKS. 

Weather, which raises this genial Warmth in Animals, 
should cover the Trees with Leaves, and the Fields 
with Grass, for their Security and Concealment, and 
produce such infinite Swarms of Insects for the 
Support and Sustenance of their respective Broods ? 

Is it not wonderful that the Love of the Parent 
should be so violent while it lasts, and that it should 
last no longer than is necessary for the Preservation of 
the Young ? 

With what Caution does the Hen provide herself a 
Nest in Places unfrequented, and free from Noise and 
Disturbance ? When she has laid her Eggs in such a 
Manner, that she can cover them, what Care does she 
take in turning them frequently, that all Parts may 
partake of the vital Warmth ? When she leaves them, 
to provide for her necessary Sustenance, how punctu- 
ally does she return before they have time to cool, and 
become incapable of producing an Animal ? In the 
Summer you see her giving herself greater Freedoms, 
and quitting her Care for above two Hours together ; 
but in Winter, when the Rigour of the Season would 
chill the Principles of Life, and destroy the young one, 
she grows more assiduous in her Attendance, and 
stays away but half the Time. When the Birth 
approaches, with how much Nicety and Attention does 
she help the Chick to break its Prison ? Not to take 



THE COVERLEY DUCKS. 97 

notice of her covering it from the Injuries of the 
Weather, providing it proper Nourishment, and teach- 
ing it to help itself; nor to mention her forsaking 
the Nest, if after the usual Time of reckoninjr the 
young one does not make its Appearance. A 
Chymical Operation could not be followed with 
greater Art or Diligence, than is seen in the hatching 
of a Chick ; though there are many other Birds that 
show an infinitely greater Sagacity in all the foremen- 
tioned Particulars. 

But at the same time the Hen, that has all this 
seeming Ingenuity, (which is indeed absolutely neces- 
sary for the Propagation of the Species) considered in 
other respects, is without the least Glimmerings of 
Thought or common Sense. She mistakes a Piece of 
Chalk for an Egg, and sits upon it in the same 
manner : She is insensible of any Increase or Dimi- 
nution in the Number of those she lays : She does not 
distinguish between her own and those of another 
Species ; and when the Birth appears of never so 
different a Bird, will cherish it for her own. In all 
these Circumstances which do not carry an immediate 
Regard to the Subsistence of herself or her Species, 
she is a very Idiot. 

There is not, in my Opinion, any thing more mys- 
terious in Nature than this Instinct in Animals, which 



98 THE COVERLET DUCKS. 

thus rises above Reason, and falls infinitely short of 
it. It cannot be accounted for by any Properties in 
Matter, and at the same time works after so odd a 
manner, that one cannot think it the Faculty of an 
intellectual Being. For my own part, I look upon it 
as upon the Principle of Gravitation in Bodies, which 
is not to be explained by any known Qualities inherent 
in the Bodies themselves, nor from any Laws of 
Mechanism, but, according to the best Notions of the 
greatest Philosophers, is an immediate Impression 
from the first Mover, and the Divine Energy acting 
in the Creatures. 

As I was walking this Morning in the great Yard 
that belongs to my Friend's Country-House, I was 
wonderfully pleased to see the different Workings of 
Instinct in a Hen followed by a Brood of Ducks. 
The Young, upon the sight of a Pond, immediately 
ran into it ; while the Step-mother, with all imaginable 
Anxiety, hovered about the Borders of it, to call them 
out of an Element that appeared to her so dangerous 
and destructive. As the different Principle which 
acted in these diflferent Animals cannot be termed 
Reason, so when we call it Instinct^ we mean some- 
thing we have no Knowledge of. To me, as I hinted 
in my last Paper, it seems the immediate Direction 
of Providence, and such an Operation of the supreme 



THE COVERLET DUCKS. 99 

Being, as that which determines all the Portions of 
Matter to their proper Centres. A modern Philoso- 
})her, quoted by Monsieur Bayle in his learned Disser- 
tation on the Souls of Brutes, delivers the same 
Opinion, though in a bolder Form of Words, where 
he says, Deus est Anima Brutorum^ God himself is 
the Soul of Brutes. Who can tell what to call that 
seeming Sagacity in Animals, which directs them to 
such Food as is proper for them, and makes them 
naturally avoid whatever is noxious or unwholesom : 
Tully has observed, that a Lamb no sooner falls from 
its Mother, but immediately, and of his own accord, 
applies itself to the Teat. Danipier, in his Travels, 
tells us, that when Seamen are thrown upon any of 
the unknown Coasts of America^ they never venture 
upon the Fruit of any Tree, how tempting soever 
it may appear, unless they observe that it is marked 
with the Pecking of Birds ; but fall on without any 
Fear or Apprehension where the Birds have been 
before them. 



CHAPTER XV. 

Sir Roger on the Bench. 

Comes jucundus in via pro vehiculo est. Publ. 

A MAN'S first Care should be to avoid the Re- 
-^ proaches of his own Heart ; his next, to escape 
the Censures of the World : If the last interferes with 
the former, it ought to be entirely neglected ; but 
otherwise there cannot be a greater Satisfaction to an 
honest Mind, than to see those Appropriations which 
it gives itself, seconded by the Applauses of the Pub- 
lick : A Man is more sure of his Conduct, when the 
Verdict which he passes upon his own Behaviour is 
thus warranted and confirmed by the Opinion of all 
that know him. 

My worthy Friend Sir Roger is one of those who 
is not only at Peace within himself, but beloved and 
esteemed by all about him. He receives a suitable 
Tribute for his universal Benevolence to Mankind, in 
the Returns of Affection and Good-will, which are 
paid him by every one that lives within his Neigh- 



SIR ROGER ON THE BENCH. 101 

bourhood. I lately met with two or three odd Instan- 
ces of that general Respect which is shewn to the 
good old Knight. He would needs carry Will Wimble 
and myself with him to the County Assizes : As we 
were upon the Road Will Wimble joined a couple of 
plain Men who rid before us, and conversed with them 
for some time ; during which my Friend Sir Roger 
acquainted me with their Characters. 

The first of them, says he, that has a Spaniel by 
his Side, is a Yeoman of about an hundred Pounds a 
Year, an honest Man : He is just within the Game 
Act, and qualified to kill an Hare or a Pheasant: He 
knocks down a Dinner with his Gun twice or thrice a 
Week ; and by that means lives much cheaper than 
those who have not so good an Estate as himself. 
He would be a good Neighbour if he did not destroy 
so many Partridges : in short, he is a very sensible 
Man ; shoots flying ; and has been several times 
Foreman of the Petty Jury. 

The other that rides along with him is Tom Touchy^ 
a Fellow famous for taking the Laio of every Body. 
There is not one in the Town where he lives that he 
has not sued at a Quarter-Sessions. The Rogue had 
once the Impudence to go to Law with the Widow. 
His Head is full of Costs, Damages, and Ejectments : 
He plagued a couple of honest Gentlemen so long 



102 SIR ROGER ON THE BENCH. 

for a Trespass in breaking one of his Hedges, till he 
was forced to sell the Ground it enclosed to defray 
the Charges of the Prosecution : His Father left him 
fourscore Pounds a Year ; but he has cast and been 
cast so often, that he is not now worth thirty. I sup- 
pose he is going upon the old Business of the Willow- 
Tree. 

As Sir Roger was giving me this Account of Tom 
Touchy, Will Wimble and his two Companions stop- 
ped short till we came up to them. After having 
paid their Respects to Sir Roger, Will told him that 
Mr. Touchy and he must appeal to him upon a Dis- 
pute that arose between them. Will it seems had 
been giving his Fellow-Travellers an Account of his 
Angling one Day in such a Hole ; when Tom Touchy, 
instead of hearing out his Story, told him that Mr. 
such an One, if he pleased, might take the Law of him 
for fishing in that Part of the River. My Friend Sir 
Roger heard them both, upon a round Trot ; and 
after having paused some time told them, with the 
Air of a Man who would not give his Judgment 
rashly, that much might he said on both Sides. They 
were neither of them dissatisfied with the Knight's 
Determination, because neither of them found himself 
in the Wrong by it : Upon w^hich we made the best 
of our Way to the Assizes. 



SIR ROGER ON THE BENCH. 103 

The Court was sat before Sir Roger came ; but 
notwithstanding all the Justices had taken their Places 
upon the Bench, they made room for the old Knight 
at the Head of them ; who, for his Reputation in the 
Country, took occasion to whisper in the Judge's Ear, 
That he laas glad his Lordship had met loith so much 
good Weather in his Circuit. I was listening to the 
Proceeding of the Court with much Attention, and 
infinitely pleased with that great Appearance and 
Solemnity which so properly accompanies such a 
publick Administration of our Laws ; when, after 
about an Hour's Sitting, I observed to my great Sur- 
prise,' in the midst of a Trial, that my Friend Sir 
Roger was getting up to speak. I was in some Pain 
for him, 'till I found he had acquitted himself of two 
or three Sentences, with a Look of much Business 
and great Intrepidity. 

Upon his first Rising the Court was hushed, and a 
general Whisper ran among the Country People that 
Sir Roger teas up. The speech he made was so 
little to the Purpose, that I shall not trouble my Read- 
ers with an Account of it ; and I believe was not so 
much designed by the Knight himself to inform the 
Court, as to give him a Figure in my Eye, and keep 
up his Credit in the Country. 

I was highly delighted, when the Court rose, to see 



104 SIR ROGER ON THE BENCH. 

the Gentlemen of the Country gathering about my old 
Friend, and striving who should compliment him most; 
at the same time that the ordinary People gazed upon 
him at a distance, not a little admiring his Courage, 
that was not afraid to speak to the Judge. 

In our Return home we met with a very odd 
Accident ; which I cannot forbear relating, because it 
shews how desirous all who know Sir Roger are of 
giving him Marks of their Esteem. When we were 
arrived upon the Verge of his Estate, we stopped at a 
little Inn to rest ourselves and our Horses. The Man 
of the Plouse had it seems been formerly a Servant in 
the Knight's Family ; and to do Honour to his old 
Master, had some time since, unknown to Sir Roger, 
put him up in a Sign-post before the Door ; so that the 
KnighVs Head had hung out upon the Road about a 
Week before he himself knew any thing of the Matter. 
As soon as Sir Roger was acquainted with it, finding 
that his Servant's Indiscretion proceeded wholly from 
Affection and Good-will, he only told him that he had 
made him too high a Compliment ; and when the 
Fellow seemed to think that could hardly be, added 
with a more decisive Look, That it was too great an 
Honour for any Man under a Duke ; but told him at 
the same time, that it might be altered with a very few 
Touches, and that he himself would be at the Charge 



SIR ROGER ON THE BENCH. 105 

of it. Accordingly they got a Painter by the Knight's 
Directions to add a pair of Whiskers to the Face, and 
by a little Aggravation of the Features to change it 
into the Saracen'' s- Head. I should not have known 
this Story had not the Inn-keeper, upon Sir Roger's 
alighting, told him in my Hearing, That his Honour's 
Head was brought back last Night with the Alterations 
that he had ordered to be made in it. Upon this my 
Friend with his usual Chearfulness related the Par- 
ticulars above-mentioned, and ordered the Head to be 
brouo;ht into the Room. I could not forbear discover- 
ing greater Expressions of Mirth than ordinary upon 
the Appearance of this monstrous Face, under which, 
notwithstandincr it was made to frown and stare in a 
most extraordinaiy manner, I could still discover a 
distant Resemblance of my old Friend. Sir Roger, 
upon seeing me laugh, desired me to tell him truly if 
I thought it possible for People to know him in that 
Disguise. I at first kept my usual Silence ; but upon 
the Knight's conjuring me to tell him whether it was 
not still more like himself than a Saracen^ I composed 
my Countenance in the best manner I could, and 
replied. That much might he said on both Sides. 

These several Adventures, with the Knight's Be- 
haviour in them, gave me as pleasant a Day as ever I 
met with in any of my Travels. 



CHAPTER XVI. 

A Story of an Heir. 

Doctrina sed vim promovet imitam, 
Eectique cultus pectora roborant : 
Utcunque defecere mores, 
Dedecorant bene nata culpcB. Hor. 1 

i S I was Yesterday taking the Air with my Friend 
-^-*- Sir Roger, we were met by a fresh-coloured 
ruddy young man who rid by us full Speed, with a 
couple of Servants behind him. Upon my Inquiry 
who he was, Sir Roger told me that he was a young 
Gentleman of a considerable Estate, who had been 
educated by a tender Mother that lived not many i 
Miles from the Place where we were. She is a very i 
good Lady, says my Friend, but took so much care of 
lier Son's Health, that she has made him good for 
nothing. She quickly found that Reading was bad 
for his Eyes, and that Writing made his Head ake. 
He was let loose amono; the Woods as soon as he was 
able to ride on Horseback, or to carry a Gun upon his 
Shoulder. To be brief, I found, by my Friend's Ac- 



i 



THE STORY OF AN HEIR. 107 

count of him, that he had got a great Stock of Health, 
but nothing else ; and that if it were a Man's Business 
only to live, there would not be a more accomplished 
young Fellow in the whole Country. 

The Truth of it is, since my residing in these Parts 
I have seen and heard innumerable Instances of 
young Heirs and elder Brothers who either from their 
own reflecting upon the Estates they are born to, and 
therefore thinking all other Accomplishments unneces- 
sary, or from hearing these Notions frequently incul- 
cated to them by the Flattery of their Servants and 
Domesticks, or from the same foolish Thought prevail- 
ing in those who have the Care of their Education, 
are of no manner of use but to keep up their Families, 
and transmit their Lands and Houses in a Line to 
Posterity. 

This makes me often think on a Stoiy I have heard 
of two Friends, which I shall give my Reader at 
large, under feigned Names. The Moral of it may, 
I hope, be useful, though there are some Circum- 
stances which make it rather appear like a Novel, 
than a true Story. 

Eudoxus and Leontine began the World with small 
Estates. They were both of them Men of good 
Sense and great Virtue. They prosecuted their Stu- 
dies too;ether in their earlier Years, and entered into 



lOS THE STORY OF AN HEIR. 

such a Friendship as lasted to the end of their Lives. 
Eudoxus, at his first setting out in the World, threw 
himself into a Court, where, by his natural Endow- 
ments and his acquired Abilities, he made his way 
from one Post to another, till at length he had raised 
a very considerable Fortune. Leontme on the con- 
trary sought all Opportunities of improving his Mind 
by Study, Conversation and Travel. He was not only 
acquainted with all the Sciences, but with the most 
eminent Professors of them throughout Europe. He 
knew perfectly well the Interests of its Princes, with 
the Customs and Fashions of their Courts, and could 
scarce meet with the Name of an extraordinary Per- 
son in the Gazette whom he had not either talked to 
or seen. In short, he had so well mixt and digested 
his Knowledge of Men and Books, that he made one 
of the most accomplished Persons of his Age. Dur- 
ing the whole Course of his Studies and Travels he 
kept up a punctual Correspondence with Eudoxus, 
who often made himself acceptable to the principal 
Men about Court by the Intelligence which he received 
from Leontine. When they were both turned of 
Forty (an Age in which, according to Mr. Coialey, 
there is no dallying with Life) they determined, pur- 
suant to the Resolution they had taken in the begin- 
ning of their Lives, to retire, and pass the Remainder 



THE STORY OF AN HEIR. 109 

of their Days in the Country. In order to this, they 
both of them married much about the same time. 
Leontine^ with his own and his Wife's Fortune, bought 
a Farm of three hundred a Year, which lay within 
the Neighbourhood of his Friend Eudoxus, who had 
purchased an Estate of as many thousands. They 
were both of them Fathers about the same time, 
Eudoxus having a Son born to him, and Leontine a 
Daughter ; but to the unspeakable Grief of the latter, 
his young Wife (in whom all his Happiness was wrapt 
up) died in a few Days after the Birth of her Daugh- 
ter. His Affliction would have been insupportable, 
had not he been comforted by the daily Visits and 
Conversations of his Friend. As they were one Day 
talking together with their usual Intimacy, Leontine, 
considering how incapable he was of giving his 
Daughter a proper Education in his own House, and 
Eudoxus reflecting on the ordinary Behaviour of a 
Son who knows himself to be the Heir of a great 
Estate, they both agreed upon an Exchange of Chil- 
dren, namely, that the Boy should be bred up with 
Leontine as his Son, and that the Girl should live 
with Eudoxus as his Daughter, till they were each of 
them arrived at Years of Discretion. The Wife of 
Eudoxus, knowing that her Son could not be so advan- 
tageously brought up as under the Care of Leontine, 



110 THE STORY OF AN HEIR. 

and considering at the same time that he would be 
perpetually under her own Eye, was by Degrees 
prevailed upon to fall in with the Project. She there- 
fore took Leonilla^ for that was the Name of the 
Girl, and educated her as her own Daughter. The 
two Friends on each side had wrought themselves to 
such an habitual Tenderness for the Children who 
were under their Direction, that each of them had the 
real Passion of a Father, where the Title was but 
imaginary. Florio, the Name of the young Heir 
that lived with Leontine, though he had all the Duty 
and Affection imaginable for his supposed Parent, 
was taught to rejoice at the Sight of Eudoxus, who 
visited his Friend very frequently, and was dictated 
by his natural Affection, as well as by the Rules of 
Prudence, to make himself esteemed and beloved by 
Florio. The Boy was now old enough to know his 
supposed Father's Circumstances, and that therefore 
he was to make his way in the World by his own 
Industry. This Consideration grew stronger in him 
every Day, and produced so good an Effect, that he 
applied himself with more than ordinary Attention 
to the Pursuit of every thing which Leontine recom- 
mended to him. His natural Abilities, which were 
very good, assisted by the Directions of so excellent 
a Counsellor, enabled him to make a quicker Progress 



THE STORY OF AN HEIR. Ill 

than ordinary through all the Parts of his Education. 
Before he was twenty Years of Age, having finished 
his Studies and Exercises with great Applause, he 
was removed from the University to the Inns of Court, 
where there are very few that make themselves con- 
siderable Proficients in the Studies of the Place, who 
know they shall arrive at great Estates without them. 
This was not Florio'^s Case ; he found that three 
hundred a Year was but a poor Estate for Leontine 
and himself to live upon, so that he studied without 
Intermission till he gained a very good Insight into the 
Constitution and Laws of his Country. 

I should have told my Reader, that whilst Florio 
lived at the House of his Foster-father, he was always 
an acceptable Guest in the Family of Eudoxus, where 
he became acquainted with Leonilla from her Infancy. 
His Acquaintance with her by degrees grew into 
Love, which, in a Mind trained up in all the Senti- 
ments of Honour and Virtue, became a very uneasy 
Passion. He despaired of gaining an Heiress of so 
great a Fortune, and would rather have died than 
attempted it by any indirect Methods. Leonilla, who 
was a Woman of the greatest Beauty joined with the 
greatest Modesty, entertained at the same time a secret 
Passion for Florio, but conducted herself with so 
niucli Prudence that she never gave him the least 



112 THE STORY OF AN HEIR. 

Intimation of it. Florio was now engaged in all 
those Arts and Improvements that are proper to raise 
a Man's private Fortune, and give him a Figure in 
his Country, but secretly tormented with that Passion 
which burns with the greatest Fury in a virtuous and 
noble Heart, when he received a sudden Summons 
from Leojitine, to repair to him in the Country the 
next Day. For it seems Eudoxus was so filled with 
the Report of his Son's Reputation, that he could no 
longer withhold making himself known to him. The 
Morning after his Arrival at the House of his supposed 
Father, Leontine told him that Eudoxus had something 
of great Importance to communicate to him ; upon 
which the good Man embraced him and wept. Florio 
was no sooner arrived at the great House that stood 
in his Neighbourhood, but Eudoxus took him by the 
Hand, after the first Salutes were over, and conducted 
him into his Closet. He there opened to him the 
whole Secret of his Parentage and Education, con- 
cluding after this manner : 1 have no other way left 
of acknowledging my Gratitude to Leontine, than iy 
marrying you to his Daughter. He shall not lose the 
Pleasure of being your Father by the Discovery I 
have made to you. Leonilla, too, shall be still my 
Daughter ; her filial Piety, though misplaced, has 
been so exemjjlary, that it deserves the greatest Reivard 



THE STORY OF AN HEIR. 113 

I can confer upon it. You shall have the pleasure of 
seeing a great Estate fall to you, which you would 
have lost the Relish of had you known yourself born 
to it. Continue only to deserve it in the same manner 
you did before you loere possessed of it. I have left 
your Mother in the next Room. Her Heart yearns 
toicards you. She is making the same Discoveries 
to Leonilla which I have made to yourself Florio 
was so overwhelmed with this Profusion of Happiness, 
that he was not able to make a Reply, but threw 
himself down at his Father's Feet, and amidst a flood 
of Tears, kissed and embraced his Knees, asking his 
Blessing, and expressing in dumb Show those Senti- 
ments of Love, Duty, and Gratitude that were too big 
for Utterance. To conclude, the happy Pair were 
married, and half Eudoxus'^s Estate settled upon 
them. Leontine and Eudoxus passed the Remainder 
of their Lives together ; and received in the dutiful 
and affectionate Behaviour of Florio and Leonilla the 
just Recompence, as well as the natural Effects, of 
that Care which they had bestowed upon them in their 
Education. 



CHAPTER XYII. 

Sir Roger and Party Spirit. 

Ne, pueri, ne tanta animis assuescite bella : 

Neu patrice validas in viscera vertite vires. Vma. 

II /TY worthy Friend Sir Roger, when we are talking 
■^'-'- of the Malice of Parties, very frequently tells us 
an Accident that happened to him when he was a 
School-boy, which was at a time when the Feuds ran 
high between the Round-heads and Cavaliers. This 
worthy Knight, being then but a Stripling, had occa- 
sion to inquire which was the Way to St. Anne's 
Lane, upon which the Person whom he spoke to, 
instead of answering his Question, called him a young 
Popish Cur, and asked him who had made Anne a 
Saint ! The Boy, being in some Confusion, inquired 
of the next he met, which was the Way to Anne'^s 
Lane ; but was called a prick-eared Cur for his Pains, 
and instead of being shewn the Way, was told that 
she had been a Saint before he was born, and would 
be one after he was hanged. Upon this, says Sir 



SIR ROGER AND PARTY SPIRIT. 115 

Roger, I did not think fit to repeat the former Ques- 
tion, but going into every Lane of the Neighbour- 
hood, asked what they called the Name of that Lane. 
By which ingenious Artifice he found out the Place he 
inquired after, without giving Offence to any Party. 
Sir Roger generally closes this Narrative with Re- 
flexions on the Mischief that Parties do in the Country ; 
how they spoil good Neighbourhood, and make honest 
Gentlemen hate one another ; besides that they mani- 
festly tend to the prejudice of the Land-Tax, and the 
Destruction of the Game. 

There cannot a greater Judgment befal a Country 
than such a dreadful Spirit of Division as rends a 
Government into two distinct People, and makes them 
greater Strangers and more averse to one another, 
than if they were actually two different Nations. The 
Effects of such a Division are pernicious to the last 
degree, not only with regard to those Advantages 
which they give the Common Enemy, but to those 
private Evils which they produce in the Heart of 
almost every particular Person. This Influence is 
very fatal both to Men's Morals and their Understand- 
ings ; it sinks the Virtue of a Nation, and not only so, 
but destroys even Common Sense. 

A furious Party Spirit, when it rages in its full 
Violence, exerts itself in Civil War and Bloodshed ; 



116 SIR ROGER AND PARTY SPIRIT. 

and when it is under its greatest Restraints naturally 
breaks out in Falsehood, Detraction, Calumny, and a 
partial Administration of Justice. In a word, it fills a 
Nation with Spleen and Rancour, and extinguishes all 
the Seeds of Good-nature, Compassion, and Human- 
ity. 

I remember to have read in Diodoriis Siculus an 
Account of a very active little Animal, which I think 
he calls the Ichneumon, that makes it the whole Busi- 
ness of his Life to break the Eggs of the Crocodile, 
which he is always in search after. This Instinct is 
the more remarkable, because the Ichneumon never 
feeds upon the Eggs he has broken, nor any other 
Way finds his Account in them. Were it not for the 
incessant Labours of this industrious Animal, jEgypt, 
says the Historian, would be over-run with Crocodiles ; 
for the ^Egyptians are so far from destroying those 
pernicious Creatures, that they worship them as Gods. 

If we look into the Behaviour of ordinary Partizans, 
we shall find them far from resembling this disinter- 
ested Animal ; and rather acting after the Example 
of the wild Tartars, who are ambitious of destroying 
a Man of the most extraordinary Parts and Accom- 
plishments, as thinking that upon his Decease the 
same Talents, whatever Post they qualified him for, 
enter of Course into his Destroyer. 



SIR ROGER AND PARTY SPIRIT. 117 

As in the whole Train of my Speculations, I have 
endeavoured as much as I am able to extinguish that 
pernicious Spirit of Passion and Prejudice, which 
rages with the same Violence in all Parties, I am still 
the more desirous of doing some Good in this Particu- 
lar, because I observe that the Spirit of Party reigns 
more in the Country than in the Town. It here con- 
tracts a kind of Brutality and rustick Fierceness, to 
which Men of a politer Conversation are wholly Stran- 
gers. It extends itself even to the Return of the Bow 
and the Hat ; and at the same time that the Heads of 
Parties preserve towards one another an outward Show 
of Good-breeding, and keep up a perpetual Intercourse 
of Civilities, their Tools that are dispersed in these 
outlying Parts will not so much as mingle together at 
a Cock-match. This Humour fills the Country with 
several periodical Meetings of Whig Jockies and Tory 
Fox-hunters ; not to mention the innumerable Curses, 
Frowns, and Whispers it produces at a Quarter- 
Sessions. 

I do not know whether I have observed in any of 
my former Papers, that my Friends Sir Roger be 
CovERLEY and Sir Andrew Freeport are of different 
Principles, the first of them inclined to the landed^ 
and the other to the monied Interest. This Humour is 
so moderate in each of them, that it proceeds no farther 



118 SIR ROGER AND PARTY SPIRIT. 

than to an agreeable Rallery, which very often diverts 
the rest of the Club. I find however that the Knight 
is a much stronger Tory in the Country than in Town, 
which, as he has told me in my Ear, is absolutely 
necessary for the keeping up his Interest. In all our 
Journey from London to his House we did not so 
much as bait at a Whig-Inn ; or if by chance the 
Coachman stopped at a wrong Place, one of Sir 
Roger's Servants would ride up to his Master full 
Speed, and whisper to him that the Master of the 
House was against such an one in the last Election. 
This often betrayed us into hard Beds and bad Cheer ; 
for we were not so inquisitive about the Inn as the 
Inn-keeper ; and, provided our Landlord's Principles 
were sound, did not take any Notice of the Staleness 
of his Provisions. This I found still the more incon- 
venient, because the better the Host was, the worse 
generally were his Accommodations ; the Fellow 
knowing very well that those who were his Friends 
would take up with coarse Diet and an hard Lodging. 
For these Reasons, all the while I was upon the Road 
I dreaded entering into an House of any one that Sir 
Roger had applauded for an honest Man. 

Since my Stay at Sir Roger's in the Country, I 
daily find more Instances of this narrow Party-humour. 
Being upon a Bowling-green at a neighbouring Market 



SIR ROGER AND PARTY SPIRIT. 119 

Town the other Day, (for that is the Place where the 
Gentlemen of one Side meet once a Week) I observed 
a Stranger among them of a better Presence and 
genteeler Behaviour than ordinary ; but was much 
surprised, that notwithstanding he was a very fair 
Better^ no Body would take him up. But upon In- 
quiry 1 found, that he was one who had given a disa- 
greeable Vote in a former Parliament, for which 
Reason there was not a Man upon that Bowling- 
green who would have so much Correspondence with 
him as to win his Money of him. 

Among other instances of this Nature, I must not 
omit one vvhich concerns myself. Will Wimble was 
the other Day relating several strange Stories that 
he had picked up no Body knows where of a certain 
great Man ; and upon my staring at him, as one 
that was suprised to hear such Things in the Coun- 
try, which had never been so much as whispered in 
the Town, Will stopped short in the Thread of his 
Discourse, and after Dinner asked my Friend Sir 
Roger in his Ear if he was sure that I was not a 
Fanatick. 

It gives me a serious Concern to see such a Spirit 
of Dissension in the Country ; not only as it destroys 
Virtue and common Sense, and renders us in a manner 
Barbarians towards one another, but as it perpetuates 



120 



SIR ROGER AND PARTY SPIRIT. 



our Animosities, widens our Breaches, and transmits 
our present Passions and Prejudices to our Posterity. 
For my own part, I am sometimes afraid that I dis- 
cover the Seeds of a Civil War in these our Divisions ; 
and therefore cannot but bewail, as in their first Prin- 
ciples, the Miseries and Calamities of our Children. 



CHAPTER XVIII. 

On Gipsies in General. 

Semperque recentes 
Convectare juvat prcedas, ^ vivere rapto . Vikg. 

A S I was Yesterday riding out in the Fields with 
■^^ my Friend Sir Roger, we saw at a little Distance 
from us a Troop of Gipsies. Upon the first Dis- 
covery of them, my Friend was in some doubt whe- 
ther he should not exert the Justice of the Peace upon 
such a Band of Lawless Vagrants ; but not having 
his Clerk with him, who is a necessary Counsellor 
on these Occasions, and fearing that his Poultry might 
fare the worse for it, he let the Thought drop : But 
at the same time gave me a particular Account of 
the Mischiefs they do in the Country, in stealing 
People's Goods and spoiling their Servants. If a 
stray Piece of Linen hangs upon an Hedge, says Sir 
Roger, they are sure to have it ; if the Hog loses his 
Way in the Fields, it is ten to one but he becomes 
their Prey ; our Geese cannot live in Peace for them ; 



122 ON GIPSIES IN GENERAL. 

if a Man prosecutes them with Seventy, his Henroost 
is sure to pay for it : They generally straggle into 
these Parts about this Time of the Year ; and set the 
Heads of our Servant-Maids so agog for Husbands, 
that we do not expect to have any Business done as it 
should be whilst they are in the Country. I have an 
honest Dairy-maid who crosses their Hands with a 
Piece of Silver every Summer, and never fails being 
promised the handsomest young Fellow in the Parish 
for her pains. Your Friend the Butler has been Fool 
enough to be seduced by them ; and, though he is 
sure to lose a Knife, a Fork, or a Spoon every time 
his Fortune is told him, generally shuts himself up in 
the Pantry with an old Gipsy for above half an Hour 
once in a Twelvemonth. Sweet-hearts are the things 
they live upon, which they bestow very plentifully 
upon all those that apply themselves to them. You 
see now and then some handsom young Jades among 
them: The Sluts have very often white Teeth and 
black Eyes. 

Sir Roger observing that I listened with great 
Attention to his Account of a People who were so 
entirely new to me, told me. That if I would they 
should tell us our Fortunes. As I was very well 
pleased with the Knight's Proposal, we rid up and 
communicated our Hands to them. A Cassandra of 



THE COVERLEY GIPSIES. 123 

the Crew, after having examined my Lines very dili- 
gently, told me. That I loved a pretty Maid in a 
Corner, that 1 was a good Woman's Man, with some 
other Particulars which I do not think proper to relate. 
My Friend Sir Roger alighted from his Horse, and 
exposing his Palm to two or three that stood by him, 
they crumpled it into all Shapes, and diligently 
scanned every Wrinkle that could be made in it ; 
when one of them, who was older and more Sun-burnt 
than the rest, told him. That he had a Widow in his 
Line of Life : Upon which the Knight cried. Go, go, 
you are an idle Baggage ; and at the same time 
smiled upon me. The Gipsy finding he was not 
displeased in his Heart, told him, after a farther 
Inquiry into his Hand, that his True-love was con- 
stant, and that she should dream of him to-night : My 
old Friend cried Pish, and bid her go on. The Gipsy 
told him that he was a Bachelor, but would not be so 
long ; and that he was dearer to somebody than he 
thought: The Knight still repeated She was an idle 
Baggage, and bid her go on. Ah Master, says the 
Gipsy, that roguish Leer of yours makes a pretty 
Woman's Heart ake ; you han't that simper about the 

Mouth for nothing . The uncouth Gibberish with 

which all this was uttered like the Darkness of an 
Oracle, made us the more attentive to it. To be 



124 THE COVERLEY GIPSIES. 

short, The Knight left the Money with her that he 
had crossed her Hand with, and got up again on his 
Horse. 

As we were riding away. Sir Roger told me, that 
he knew several sensible People who believed these 
Gipsies now and then foretold very strange things ; 
and for half an Hour together appeared more jocund 
than ordinary. In the Height of his Good-humour, 
meeting a common Beggar upon the Road who was 
no Conjurer, as he went to relieve him he found his 
Pocket was picked : That being a Kind of Palmistry 
at which this Race of Vermin are very dexterous. 



CHAPTER XIX. 

A Summons to London. 
Ipscs rursum concedite Sylva. Virg. 

TT is usual for a Man who loves Country Sports to 
-*- preserve the Game in his own Grounds, and divert 
himself upon those that belong to his Neighbour. My 
Friend Sir Roger generally goes two or three Miles 
from his House, and gets into the Frontiers of his 
Estate, before he beats about in search of a Hare or 
Partridge, on purpose to spare his own Fields, where 
he is always sure of finding Diversion when the worst 
comes to the worst. By this Means the Breed about 
his House has time to increase and multiply, besides 
that the Sport is the more agreeable where the Game 
is the harder to come at, and where it does not lie so 
thick as to produce any Perplexity or Confusion in the 
Pursuit. For these Reasons the Country Gentleman, 
like the Fox, seldom preys near his own Home. 

In the same manner I have made a Month's Excur- 
sion out of the Town, which is the great Field of 



123 A SUMMONS TO LONDON. 

Game for Sportsmen of my Species, to try my For- 
tune in the Country, where I have started several 
Subjects, and hunted them down, with some Pleasure 
to myself, and I hope to others. I am here forced to 
use a great deal of Diligence before 1 can spring any- 
thing to my Mind, whereas in Town, whilst I am 
following one Character, it is ten to one but I am 
crossed in my way by another, and put up such a 
Variety of odd Creatures in both Sexes, that they foil 
the Scent of one another, and puzzle the Chace. My 
greatest Difficulty in the Country is to find Sport, and 
in Town to choose it. In the mean time, as I have 
given a whole Month's Rest to the Cities of London 
and Westminster, I promise myself abundance of new 
Game upon my return thither. 

It is indeed high time for me to leave the Country, 
since I find the whole Neighbourhood begin to grow 
very inquisitive after my Name and Character : My 
Love of Solitude, Taciturnity, and particular way of 
Life, having raised a great Curiosity in all these 
Parts. 

The Notions which have been framed of me are 
various ; some look upon me as very proud, some as 
very modest, and some as very melancholy. Will 
Wimhle, as my Friend the Butler tells me, observing 
me very much alone, and extremely silent when I am 



A SUMMONS TO LONDON. 127 

in Company, is afraid I have killed a Man. The 
Country People seem to suspect me for a Conjurer ; 
and some of them hearing of the Visit which I made 
to Moll While., will needs have it that Sir Roger has 
brought down a cunning Man with him, to cure the 
old Woman, and free the Country from her Charms. 
So that the Character which I go under in part of the 
Neighbourhood, is what they here call a White Witch. 

A Justice of Peace, who lives about five Miles off, 
and is not of Sir Roger's Party, has it seems said 
twice or thrice at his Table, that he wishes Sir Roger 
does not harbour a Jesuit in his House, and that he 
thinks the Gentlemen of the Country would do very 
well to make me give some Account of myself. 

On the other side, some of Sir Roger's Friends 
are afraid the old Knight is imposed upon by a design- 
ing Fellow, and as they have heard that he converses 
very promiscuously, when he is in Town, do not know 
but he has brought down with him some discarded 
Whig, that is sullen and says nothing because he is 
out of Place. 

Such is the Variety of Opinions which are here 
entertained of me, so that I pass among some for a 
disaffected Person, and among others for a Popish 
Priest, among some for a Wizard, and among others 
for a Murderer ; and all this for no other Reason, that 



128 A SUMMONS TO LONDON. 

I can imagine, but because I do not hoot and hollow 
and make a Noise. It is true my Friend Sir Roger 
tells them, That it is my way, and that I am only a 
Philosopher ; but this will not satisfy them. They 
think there is more in me than he discovers, and that 
I do not hold my Tongue for nothing. 

For these and other Reasons I shall set out for 
London to-morrow, having found by Experience that 
the Countiy is not a Place for a Person of my Temper, 
who does not love jollity, and what they call good 
Neighbourhood. A Man that is out of Humour when 
an unexpected Guest breaks in upon him, and does 
not care for sacrificing an Afternoon to every Chance- 
comer ; that will be the Master of his own Time, and 
the Pursuer of his own Inclinations, makes but a very 
unsociable Figure in this kind of Life. I shall there- 
fore retire into the Town, if I may make use of that 
Phrase, and get into the Crowd again as fast as I can 
m order to be alone. I can there raise what Specula- 
tions I please upon others without being observed 
myself, and at the same time enjoy all the Advantages 
of Company with all the Privileges of Solitude. In 
the mean while, to finish the Month and conclude 
these my rural Speculations, I shall here insert a 
Letter from my Friend Will Honeycomb, who has 
not lived a Month for these forty Years out of the 



A SUMMONS TO LONDON. 129 

Smoke of London^ and rallies me after his way upon 
my Country Life. 



I 



' Bear Spec, 

Suppose this Letter will find thee picking of 
Daisies, or smelling to a Lock of Hay, or pass- 
' ing away thy Time in some innocent Country Diver- 
' sion of the like Nature. I have however Orders 

* from the Club to summon thee up to Town, being 
' all of us cursedly afraid thou wilt not be able to 

* relish our Company, after thy Conversations with 
' Moll White and Will Wimble. Pr'ythee don't send 
' us up any more Stories of a Cock and a Bull, nor 
' frighten the Town with Spirits and Witches. Thy 
' Speculations begin to smell confoundedly of Woods 
' and Meadows. If thou dost not come up quickly, 
' we shall conclude that thou art in Love with one of 
' Sir Roger's Dairy-Maids. Service to the Knight. 

* Sir Andrew is grown the Cock of the Club since he 
' left us, and if he does not return quickly will make 
' every Mother's Son of us Commonwealth's Men. 

' Dear Spec, Thine Eternally^ 
' Will Honeycomb.' 



CHAPTER XX. 

Farewell to Coverley Hall. 

Qui, ant Tempus quid postulet non videt, aut flura loquitur, aut 
se ostejitat, aut eorum quibuscum est rationem non habet, is 
ineptus esse dicitur. Tull. 

TTAVING notified to my good Friend Sir Roger 
-*— ^ that I should set out for London the next Day, 
his Horses were ready at the appointed Hour in the 
Evening ; and attended by one of his Grooms, I ar- 
rived at the County-Town at Twilight, in order to be 
ready for the Stage-coach the Day following. As 
soon as we arrived at the Inn, the Servant, who waited 
upon me, inquired of the Chamberlain in my Hearing 
what Company he had for the Coach ? The Fellow 
answered, Mrs. Betty Arable the great Fortune, and 
the Widow her Mother ; a recruiting Officer (who took 
a Place because they were to go ;) young Squire 
Quickset her Cousin (that her Mother wished her to be 
married to ;) Ephraim the Quaker, her Guardian ; 
and a Gentleman that had studied himself dumb from 
Sir Roger de Coverley's. I observed by what he 



FAREWELL TO COVERLEY HALL. 131 

said of myself, that according to his Office he dealt 
much in Intelligence ; and doubted not but there was 
some foundation for his Reports for the rest of the 
Company, as well as for the whimsical Account he 
gave of me. 

The next Morning at Day-break we were all called ; 
and I, who know my own natural shyness, and en- 
deavour to be as little liable to be disputed with as 
possible, dressed immediately, that I might make no 
one wait. The first preparation for our Setting out 
was, that the Captain's Half-Pike was placed near the 
Coachman, and a Drum behind the Coach. In the 
meantime the Drummer, the Captain's Equipage, was 
very loud, that none of the Captain's Things should 
be placed so as to be spoiled ; upon which his Cloke- 
bag was fixed in the Seat of the Coach ; and the Cap- 
tain himself, according to a frequent, though invidious 
Behaviour of Military Men, ordered his Men to look 
sharp, that none but one of the Ladies should have the 
Place he had taken fronting to the Coach-box. 

We were in some little time fixed in our Seats, and 
sat with that dislike which People not too good- 
natured usually conceive of each other at first Sight. 
The Coach jumbled us insensibly into some sort of 
Familiarity : and we had not moved above two Miles, 
when the Widow asked the Captain what Success he 



132 FAREWELL TO COVERLET HALL. 

had in his Recruiting ? The Officer with a Frankness 
he believed very graceful, told her, ' That indeed he 
' had but very little Luck, and had suffered much by 
' Desertion, therefore should be glad to end his War- 
' fare in the Service of her or her fair Daughter. In a 
' word,' continued he, ' I am a Soldier, and to be plain 
' is my Character : You see me. Madam, young, sound, 

* and impudent ; take me yourself. Widow, or give me 

* to her, I will be wholly at your Disposal. I am a 
' Soldier of Fortune, ha ! ' This was followed by a 
vain Laugh of his own, and a deep Silence of all the 
rest of the Company. I had nothing left for it but to 
fall fast asleep, which I did with all Speed. ' Come,' 
said he, ' resolve upon it, we will make a Wedding at 
' the next Town : We will wake this pleasant Com- 
' panion who is fallen asleep, to be the Brideman, and ' 
(giving the Quaker a Clap on the Knee) he concluded, 
' This sly Saint, who, I'll warrant, understands what's 
' what as well as you or I, Widow, shall give the Bride 
' as Father.' 

The Quaker, who happened to be a Man of Smart- 
ness, answered, 'Friend, I take it in good part, that 
' thou hast given me the Authority of a Father over 
' this comely and virtuous Child ; and I must assure 
' thee, that if I have the giving her, I shall not bestow 
' her on thee. Thy Mirth, Friend, savoureth of Folly : 



FAREWELL TO COVERLEY HALL. 133 

' Thou art a Person of a light Mind ; thy Drum is a 
' Type of thee, it soundeth because it is empty. Verily 
' it is not from thy Fulness, but thy Emptiness that 
' thou hast spoken this Day. Friend, Friend, we have 
' hired this Coach in Partnership with thee, to carry us 
' to the great City ; we cannot go any other Way. 
' This worthy Mother must hear thee if thou wilt needs 
' utter thy Follies ; we cannot help it. Friend, I say : 
' if thou wilt, we must hear thee : But if thou wert a 
' Man of Understanding, thou wouldst not take Ad- 
' vantage of thy courageous Countenance to abash us 
' Children of Peace. Thou art, thou sayest, a Soldier : 
' give Quarter to us, who cannot resist thee. Why 
' didst thou fleer at our Friend, who feigned himself 
'asleep? he said nothing; but how dost thou know 
' what he containeth ? If thou speakest improper 
' things in the Hearing of this virtuous young Virgin, 
'• consider it as an Outrage against a distressed Person 
' that cannot get from thee : To speak indiscreetly 
' what we are obliged to hear, by being hasped up with 
' thee in this publick Vehicle, is in some degree as- 
' saulting on the hig-h Road.' 

Here Ephraim paused, and the Captain with an 
happy and uncommon Impudence (which can be con- 
victed and support itself at the same time) cries, 
' Faith, Friend, I thank thee ; I should have been a 



134 FAREWELL TO COVERLEY HALL. 

' little impertinent if thou hadst not reprimanded me. 
' Come, thou art, I see, a smoky old Fellow, and I'll be 
' very orderly the ensuing Part of my Journey. 1 
' was going to give myself Airs, but. Ladies, I beg 
' Pardon.' 

The Captain was so little out of Humour, and our 
Company was so far from being soured by this little 
Ruffle, that Ephraini and he took a peculiar Delight in 
being agreeable to each other for the future ; and 
assumed their different Provinces in the Conduct of the 
Company. Our Reckonings, Apartments, and Accom- 
modation, fell under Ejihraim : and the Captain looked 
to all Disputes on the Road, as the good Behaviour of 
our Coachman, and the right we had of taking Place 
as going to London of all Vehicles coming from 
thence. 

The Occurrences we met with were ordinary, and 
very little happened which could entertain by the 
Relation of them : But when I considered the Com- 
pany we were in, I took it for no small Good-fortune 
that the whole Journey was not spent in Impertinen- 
ces, which to the one Part of us might be an Enter- 
tainment, to the other a Suffering. 

What therefore Ephraim said when we were almost 
arrived at London., had to me an Air not only of good 
Understanding but good Breeding. Upon the young 



FAREWELL TO COVERLEY HALL. 135 

Lady's expressing her Satisfaction in the Journey, and 
declaring how delightful it had been to her, Ephraim 
delivered himself as follows : ' There is no ordinary 
' Part of human Life which, expresseth so much a good 
' Mind, and a right inward Man, as his Behaviour upon 
' meeting with Strangers, especially such as may seem 
' the most unsuitable Companions to him : Such a 
' Man, when he falleth in the way with Persons of 
' Simplicity and Innocence, however knowing he may 
' be in the Ways of Men, will not vaunt himself 
'thereof; but will the rather hide his Superiority to 
' them, that he may not be painful unto them. My 
' good Friend, (continued he, turning to the Officer) 
' thee and I are to part by and by, and peradventure 
' we may never meet again : But be advised by a plain 
' man ; Modes and Apparel are but Trifles to the real 
' Man, therefore do not think such a Man as thyself 
' terrible for thy Garb, nor such a one as me con- 
' temptible for mine. When two such as thee and I 
' meet, with Affections as we ought to have towards 
' each other, thou shouldst rejoice to see my peaceable 
' Demeanour, and I should be glad to see thy Strength 
' and Ability to protect me in it.' 



CHAPTER XXL 

Sir Roger in London. 

^vo rarissima nostra 
Simplicitas. Oa^d. 

T WAS this Morning surprised with a great knocking 
-*- at the Door, when my Landlady's Daughter came 
up to me, and told me that there was a man below 
desired to speak with me. Upon my asking her who it 
was, she told me it was a very grave elderly Person, but 
that she did not know his Name. I immediately went 
down to him, and found him to be the Coachman of 
my worthy Friend Sir Roger de Covekley. He told 
me that his Master came to Town last Night, and 
would be glad to take a Turn with me in Gray'^s-Inn 
Walks. As I was wondering in myself what had 
brought Sir Roger to Town, not having lately re- 
ceived any Letter from him, he told me that his 
Master was come up to get a Sight of Prince Eugene., 
and that he desired I would immediately meet him. 
I was not a little pleased with the Curiosity of the 



SIR KOGER IN LONDON. 137 

old Knight, though I did not much wonder at it, 
having heard him say more than once in private Dis- 
course, that he looked upon Prince Eugcnio (for so 
the Knight always calls him) to be a greater man than 
Scanderheg. 

I was no sooner come into Gray''s-Inn Walks, but I 
heard my Friend upon the Terrace hemming twice or 
thrice to himself with great Vigour, for he loves to 
clear his Pipes in good Air (to make use of his own 
Phrase), and is not a little pleased with any one who 
takes notice of the Strength which he still exerts in 
his Morning Hemms. 

I was touched with a secret Joy at the Sight of the 
good old Man, who before he saw me was engaged in 
Conversation with a Beggar-Man that had asked an 
Alms of him. I could hear my Friend chide him for 
not finding out some Work ; but at the same time saw 
him put his Hand in his Pocket and give him Six- 
pence. 

Our Salutations were very hearty on both Sides, 
consisting of many kind Shakes of the Hand, and 
several affectionate Looks which we cast upon one 
another. After which the Knight told me my good 
Friend his Chaplain was very well, and much at my 
Service, and that the Sunday before he had made a 
most incomparable Sermon out of Doctor Barrow. I 



138 SIR ROGER IX LONDON. 

have left, says he, all my Affairs in his Hands, and 
being willing to lay an Obligation upon him, have 
deposited with him thirty Marks, to be distributed 
among his poor Parishioners. 

He then proceeded to acquaint me with the Welfare 
of Will Wimble. Upon which he put his Hand into 
his Fob and presented me in his Name with a 
Tobacco-Stopper, telling me that Will had been busy 
all the Beginning of the Winter, in turning great 
Quantities of them ; and that he made a Present of 
one to every Gentleman in the Country who has good 
Principles, and smokes. He added, that poor Will 
was at present under great Tribulation, for that Tom 
Touchy had taken the Law of him for cutting some 
Hazel Sticks out of one of his Hedo-es. 

Among other Pieces of News which the Knight 
brought from his Country Seat, he informed me that 
Moll White was dead ; and that about a Month after 
her Death, the Wind was so very high, that it blew 
down the End of one of his Barns. But for my own 
Part, says Sir Roger, I do not think that the old 
Woman had any Hand in it. 

He afterwards fell into an Account of the Diversions 
which had passed in his House during the Holidays ; 
for Sir Roger, after the laudable Custom of his 
Ancestors, always keeps open House at Christmas. I 



SIR ROGER IN LONDON. 139 

learned from him, that he had killed eight fat Hogs for 
this Season, that he had dealt about his Chines ver}- 
liberally amongst his Neighbours, and that in particular 
he had sent a string of Hogs-puddings with a pack of 
Cards to every poor Family in the Parish. I have 
often thought, says. Sir Roger, it happens very well 
that Christmas should fall out in the middle of Winter. 
It is the most dead uncomfortable Time of the Year, 
when the poor People would Suffer very much from 
their Poverty and Cold, if they had not good Cheer, 
warm Fires, and Christmas Gambols to support them. 
I love to rejoice their poor Hearts at this season, and to 
see the whole Village merry in my great Hall. I 
allow a double Quantity of Malt to my small Beer, 
and set it a running for twelve Days to every one that 
calls for it. I have always a Piece of cold Beef and 
a Mince-Pye upon the Table, and am wonderfully 
pleased to see my Tenants pass away a whole Evening 
in playing their innocent Tricks, and smutting one 
another. Our Friend Will Wimble is as merry as any 
of them, and shows a thousand roguish Tricks upon 
these occasions. 

I was very much delighted with the Reflexion of 
my old Friend, which carried so much Goodness in it. 
He then lanched out into the Praise of the late Act of 
Parliament for securing the Church of England^ and 



140 SIR ROGER IN LONDON. 

told me, with great Satisfaction, that he believed it 
already began to take Effect, for that a rigid Dissenter, 
who chanced to dine at his House on Christmas Day, 
had been observed to eat very plentifully of his Plum- 
porridge. 

After having dispatched all our Country Matters, Sir 
Roger made several Inquiries concerning the Club, 
and particularly of his old Antagonist Sir Andrew 
Freeport. He asked me with a kind of a Smile, 
whether Sir Andrew had not taken the Adva*ntage of 
his Absence, to vent among them some of his Re- 
publican Doctrines ; but soon after gathering up his 
Countenance into a more than ordinary Seriousness, 
Tell me truly, says he, don't you think Sir Andrew 

had a Hand in the Pope's Procession but without 

giving me time to answer him. Well, well, says he, I 
know you are a wary Man, and do not care to talk of 
publick Matters. 

The Knight then asked me, if I had seen Prince 
Eugenio, and made me promise to get him a Stand in 
some convenient Place where he might have a full 
Sight of that extraordinary Man, whose Presence does 
so much Honour to the British Nation. He dwelt 
very long on the Praises of this Great General, and I 
found that, since I was with him in the Country, he 
had drawn many Observations together out of his 



SIR ROGER IN LONDOxV. 141 

reading in Baker''s Chronicle, and other Authors, who 
always lie in his Hall Window, which very much 
redound to the Honour of this Prince. 

Having passed away the greatest Part of the Morn- 
incr in hearinoc the Knight's Reflexions, which were 
partly private, and partly political, he asked me if 1 
would smoke a Pipe with him over a Dish of Coffee at 
Squire's. As I loved the old Man, I take Delight in 
complying with every thing that is agreeable to him, 
and accordingly waited on him to the Coffee-house, 
where his venerable Figure drew upon us the Eyes of 
the whole Room. He had no sooner seated himself at 
the upper End of the high Table, but he called for a 
clean Pipe, a Paper of Tobacco, a Dish of Coffee, a 
Wax-Candle, and the Supplement^ with such an Air of 
Chearfulness and Good-humour, that all the Boys in 
the Coffee-room (who seemed to take pleasure in sen'- 
ing him) were at once employed on his several 
Errands, insomuch that no Body else could come at 
a Dish of Tea, till the Knight had got all his Con- 
veniences about him. 



M 



CHAPTER XXIL 

Sir Roger in Westminster Abbey. 
Ire iamen restat, Numa quo devenit, et Ancus. Hon. 
Y Friend Sir Roger de Covehley told me t'other 

IVI 

•^'-^ Night, that he had been reading my Paper upon 
Westminster- Abhey, in which, says he, there are a 
great many ingenious Fancies. He told me at the same 
time, that he observed I had promised another Paper 
upon the Tomhs, and that he should be glad to go and 
see them with me, not having visited them since he 
had read History. I could not at first imagine how 
this came into the Knight's Head, till I recollected that 
he had been very busy all last Summer upon Baker'' s 
Chronicle, which he has quoted several times in his 
Disputes with Sir Andrew Freeport since his last 
coming to Town. Accordingly I promised to call 
upon him the next Morning, that we might go together 
to the Abbey. 

I found the Knight under his Butler's Hands, who 



SIR ROGER IN WESTMINSTER ABBEY. 143 

always shaves him. He was no sooner Dressed, than 
he called for a Glass of the Widow Tmehy''s Water, 
which he told me he always drank before he went 
abroad. He recommended to me a Dram of it at the 
same time, with so much Heartiness, that I could not 
forbear drinking it. As soon as I had got it down, I 
found it very unpalatable ; upon which the Knight 
observing that I had made several wry Faces, told me 
that he knew I should not like it at first, but that it was 
the best thing in the W^orld against the Stone or 
Gravel. 

I could have wished indeed that he had acquainted 
me with the Virtues of it sooner ; but it was too late 
to complain, and I knew what he had done was out of 
Good-will. Sir Roger told me further, that he looked 
upon it to be very good for a Man whilst he staid in 
Town, to keep off Infection, and that he got together a 
Quantity of it upon the first News of the Sickness 
being at Dantzick : When of a sudden turning short 
to one of his Servants, who stood behind him, he bid 
him call a Hackney-Coach, and take care it was an 
elderly Man that drove it. 

He then resumed his Discourse upon Mrs. Truehifs 
Water, telling me that the Widow Trueby was one 
who did more good than all the Doctors and Apothe- 
caries in the Country : That she distilled every Poppy 



144 SIR ROGER IN WESTMINSTER ABBEY, 

that grew within five miles of her ; that she distributed 
her Water gratis among all sorts of People ; to which 
the Knight added, that she had a very great Jointure, 
and that the whole Country would fain have it a Match 
between him and her ; and truly, says Sir Roger, if I 
had not been engaged, perhaps I could not have done 
better. 

His Discourse was broken off by his Man's telling 
him he had called a Coach. Upon our going to it, after 
having cast his Eye upon the Wheels, he asked the 
Coachman if his Axletree was good ; upon the Fellow's 
telling him he would warrant it, the Knight turned to 
me, told me he looked like an honest Man, and went 
in without further Ceremony. 

We had not gone far, when Sir Roger, popping out 
his Head, called the Coachman down from his Box, 
and, upon his presenting himself at the Window, 
asked him if he smoked ; as I was considering what 
this would end in, he bid him stop by the way at any 
good Tobacconist's, and take in a Roll of their best 
Virginia. Nothing material happened in the re- 
maining Part of our Journey, till we were set down at 
the West-end of the Ahley. 

As we went up the Body of the Church, the Knight 
pointed at the Trophies upon one of the new Monu- 
ments, and cried out, A brave Man I warrant him ! 



SIR ROGER IN WESTMINSTER ABBEY. 145 

Passing afterwards by Sir Cloudsly Shovel, he flung 
his hand that way, and cryed, Sir Cloudsly Shovel ! a 
very gallant Man ! As we stood before Bushy''s Tomb, 
the Knight uttered himself again after the same Man- 
ner, Dr. Bushy, a great Man ! he whipped my Grand- 
father ; a very great Man ! I should have gone to him 
myself, if I had not been a Blockhead ; a very great 
Man ! 

We were immediately conducted into the little 
Chapel on the right hand. Sir Roger, planting him- 
self at our Historian's Elbow, was very attentive to 
every thing he said, particularly to the Account he 
gave us of the Lord who had cut off the King of 
Morocco'^s Head. Among several other Figures, he 
was very well pleased to see the Statesman Cecil upon 
his Knees : and concluding them all to be great Men, 
was conducted to the Figure which represents that 
Martyr to good House wifry, who died by the prick of 
a Needle. Upon our Interpreter's telling us, that she 
was a Maid of Honour to Queen Elizabeth, the Knight 
was very inquisitive into her Name and Family ; and 
after having regarded her Finger for some time, I 
wonder, says he, that Sir Richard Baker has said 
nothing of her in his Chronicle. 

We were then conveyed to the two Coronation 
Chairs, where my old Friend, after having heard that 
10 



146 SIR ROGER IN WESTMINSTER ABBEY. 

the Stone underneath the most ancient of them, which 
was brought from Scotland, was called JacoVs Pillar, 
sat himself down in the Chair ; and looking like the 
Figure of an old Gothick King, asked our Interpreter, 
what Authority they had to say, that Jacob had ever 
been in Scotland ? The Fellow, instead of returning 
him an Answer, told him, that he hoped his Honour 
would pay his Forfeit. I could observe Sir Roger a 
little ruffled upon being thus trepanned ; but our Guide 
not insisting upon his Demand, the Knight soon re- 
covered his good-humour and whispered in my Ear, 
that if Will Wimble were with us, and saw those two 
Chairs, it would go hard but he would get a Tobacco- 
Stopper out of one or t'other of them. 

Sir Roger, in the next Place, laid his hand upon 
Edward the Third's Sword, and leaning upon the 
Pommel of it, gave us the whole History of the Black 
Prince ; concluding, that, in Sir Richard Baker'' s 
Opinion, Edward the Third was one of the greatest 
Princes that ever sat upon the English Throne. 

We were then shown Edward the Confessor's 
Tomb ; upon which Sir Roger acquainted us, that he 
was the first who touched for the Evil ; and afterwards 
Henry the Fourth's, upon which he shook his Head, 
and told us there was fine Reading in the Casualties of 
that Reign. 



SIR ROGER IN WESTMINSTER ABBEY. 147 

Our Conductor then pointed to that Monument where 
there is the Figure of one of our English Kings with- 
out an Head ; and upon giving us to know, that the 
Head, which was of beaten Silver, had been stolen 
away several Years since : Some Whig, I'll warrant 
you, says Sir Roger ; you ought to lock up your 
Kings better ; they will carry off the Body too, if you 
don't take care. 

The glorious Names of Henry the Fifth and Queen 
Elizabeth gave the Knight great Opportunities of 
shining and of doing Justice to Sir Richard Baker, 
who, as our Knight observed with some Surprise, had 
a great many Kings in him, whose Monuments he had 
not seen in the Abbey. 

For my own part, I could not but be pleased to see 
the Knight show such an honest Passion for the Glory 
of his Country, and such a respectful Gratitude to the 
Memory of its Princes. 

I must not omit, that the Benevolence of my good 
old Friend, which flows out towards every one he 
converses with, made him very kind to our Interpreter, 
whom he looked upon as an extraordinary Man ; for 
which reason he shook him by the hand at parting, 
telling him, that he should be very glad to see him 
at his Lodgings in Norfolk- Buildijigs, and talk over 
these Matters with him more at leisure. 



CHAPTER, XXIII. 

Sir Roger at the Playhouse. 

Respicere exemplar vitcB morumque jubebo 
Doctum imitatorem, et veras hinc ducere voces. 

HOR. 

\/rY Friend Sir Roger de Coverley, when we last 
■^'-^ met together at the Club, told me that he had a 
great Mind to see the new Tragedy with me, assuring 
me, at the same Time, that he had not been at a Play 
these twenty Years. The last I saw, said Sir Roger, 
was the Committee, which I should not have gone to 
neither, had not I been told before-hand that it was 
a good Churc\\-of- Engl and Comedy. He then pro- 
ceeded to inquire of me who this distressed Mother 
was ; and upon hearing that she was Hector''s Widow, 
he told me that her Husband was a brave Man, and 
that when he was a School-boy, he had read his Life 
at the End of the Dictionary. My Friend asked me 
in the next Place, if there would not be some Danger 
in coming Home late, in case the Mohocks should be 



SIR ROGER AT THE TLAYHOUSE. 149 

abroad. I assure you, says he, I thought I had fallen 
into their Hands last Night ; for I observed two or 
three lusty black Men that followed me half way up 
Fleet-street, and mended their pace behind me, in 
proportion as I put on to get away from them. You 
must know, continued the Knight with a Smile, I 
fancied they had a mind to hunt me ; for I remember 
an honest Gentleman in my Neighbourhood, who was 
served such a trick in King Charles the Second's 
time ; for which reason he has not ventured himself 
in Town ever since. I might have shown them very 
good Sport, had this been their Design ; for as I am 
an old Fox-hunter, I should have turned and dodged, 
and have played them a thousand Tricks they had 
never seen in their Lives before. Sir Roger added, 
that if these Gentlemen had any such Intention, they 
did not succeed very well in it : for I threw them out, 
says he, at the End of Norfolk-street, where I doubled 
the Corner and got Shelter in my Lodgings before 
they could imagine what was become of me. How- 
ever, says the Knight, if Captain Sentry will make 
one with us to-morrow Night, and if you will both of 
you call upon me about four o'Clock, that we may be 
at the House before it is full, I will have my own 
Coach in readiness to attend you, for John tells me he 
has got the Fore-Wheels mended. 



150 SIR ROGER AT THE PLAYHOUSE. 

The Captain, who did not fail to meet me there at 
the appointed Hour, bid Sir Roger fear nothing, for 
that he had put on the same Sword which he made 
use of at the Battle of Steenkirk. Sir Roger's Ser- 
vants, and among the rest my old Friend the Butler, 
had, I found, provided themselves with good oaken 
Plants, to attend their Master upon this occasion. 
When we had placed him in his Coach, with myself 
at his left-hand, the Captain before him, and his Butler 
at the Head of his Footmen in the Rear, we convoyed 
him in Safety to the Playhouse, where, after having 
marched up the Entry in good order, the Captain and 
I went in with him, and seated him betwixt us in the 
Pit. As soon as the House was full, and the Candles 
lighted, my old Friend stood up and looked about 
him with that Pleasure, which a Mind seasoned with 
Humanity naturally feels in itself, at the sight of a 
Multitude of People who seem pleased with one ano- 
ther, and partake of the same common Entertainment. 
I could not but fancy to myself, as the old Man stood 
up in the middle of the Pit, that he made a very 
proper Centre to a tragic Audience. Upon the entring 
of Pyrrhus^ the Knight told me that he did not believe 
the King of France himself had a better Strut. I was 
indeed very attentive to my old Friend's Remarks, 
because I looked upon them as a Piece of natural 



1 



SIR ROGER AT THE PLAYHOUSE. 151 

Criticism, and was well pleased to hear him, at the 
Conclusion of almost every Scene, telling me that he 
could not imagine how the Play would end. One 
while he appeared much concerned for Andromache ; 
and a little while after as much for Hermione ; and 
was extremely puzzled to think what would become of 
Pyrrhus. 

When Sir Roger saw Andromache's obstinate Re- 
fusal to her Lover's Importunities, he whispered me in 
the Ear, that he was sure she would never have him ; 
to which he added, with a more than ordinary Vehe- 
mence, You can"'t imagine. Sir, what 'tis to have to do 
with a Widow. Upon Pyrrhus his threatning after- 
wards to leave her, the Knight shook his Head and 
muttered to himself, Ay, do if you can. This Part 
dwelt so much upon my Friend's Imagination, that at 
the close of the Third Act, as I was thinking of some- 
thing else, he whispered me in my Ear, These Widows, 
Sir, are the most perverse Creatures in the World. 
But pray, says he, you that are a Critick, is the Play 
according to your Dramatic Rules, as you call them ? 
Should your People in Tragedy always talk to be 
understood ? Why, there is not a single Sentence in 
this Play that I do not know the meaning of. 

The Fourth Act very luckily begun before I had 
time to give the old Gentleman an Answer : Well, 



152 SIR ROGER AT THE PLAYHOUSE. 

says the Knight, sitting down with great Satisfaction, I 
suppose we are now to see Hector'^s Ghost. He then 
renewed his Attention, and, from time to time, fell a 
praising the Widow. He made, indeed, a litde Mis- 
take as to one of her Pages, whom at his first entering 
he took for Astyanax ; but quickly set himself right in 
that particular, though, at the same time, he owned he 
should have been very glad to have seen the little 
Boy, who, says he, must needs be a very fine Child 
by the Account that is given of him. Upon Hermi- 
one^s going off with a Menace to Pyrrhus, the Audi- 
ence gave a loud Clap, to which Sir Roger added, on 
my Word, a notable young Baggage ! 

As there was a very remarkable Silence and Still- 
ness in the Audience during the whole Action, it was 
natural for them to take the Opportunity of these 
Intervals between the Acts, to express their Opinion 
of the Players and of their respective Parts. Sir 
Roger hearing a Cluster of them praise Orestes, 
struck in with them, and told them, that he thought his 
Friend Pylades was a very sensible Man ; as they were 
afterwards applauding Pyrrhus Sir Roger put in a 
second time : And let me tell you, says he, though he 
speaks but little, I like the old Fellow in Whiskers as 
well as any of them. Captain Sentry seeing two or 
three Wags, who sat near us, lean with an attentive 



SIR ROGER AT THE PLAYHOUSE. 153 

Ear towards Sir Roger, and fearing lest they should 
smoke the Knight, plucked him by the Elbow, and 
whispered something in his Ear, that lasted till the 
Opening of the fifth Act. The Knight was wonder- 
fully attentive to the Account which Orestes gives of 
Pyrrhus his Death, and at the Conclusion of it, told 
me it was such a bloody Piece of Work, that he was 
glad it was not done upon the Stage. Seeing after- 
ward Orestes in his raving Fit, he grew more than 
ordinary serious, and took occasion to moralize (in his 
way) upon an Evil Conscience, adding, that Orestes^ 
in his Madness, looked as if he saw something. 

As we were the first that came into the House, so 
we were the last that vv^ent out of it ; being resolved to 
have a clear Passage for our old Friend, whom we did 
not care to venture among the justling of the Crowd. 
Sir Roger went out fully satisfied with his Entertain- 
ment, and we guarded him to his Lodging in the same 
manner that we brought him to the Playhouse ; being 
highly pleased, for my own part, not only with the 
Performance of the excellent Piece which had been 
presented, but with the Satisfaction which it had given 
to the old Man. 



CHAPTER XXIY. 

Sir Roger at Vaux-Hall. 
Criminibus debent Hortos Juv. 

A S I was sitting in my Chamber and thinking on a 
-^^ Subject for my next Spectator, I heard two or 
three irregular Bounces at my Landlady's Door, and 
upon the opening of it, a loud chearful Voice inquiring 
whether the Philosopher was at Home. The Child 
who went to the Door answered very innocently, that 
he did not lodge there. I immediately recollected that 
it was my good Friend Sir Roger's Voice ; and that I 
had promised to go with him on the Water to Spring- 
Garden, in case it proved a good Evening. The 
Knight put me in mind of my Promise from the 
bottom of the Stair-Case, but told me that if 1 was 
speculating he would stay below till I had done. Upon 
my coming down, I found all the Children of the 
Family got about my old Friend, and my Landlady 
herself, who is a notable prating Gossip, engaged in a 



SIR ROGER AT VAUX-HALL. 155 

Conference with him ; being mightily pleased with his 
stroking her little Boy upon the Head, and bidding him 
be a good Child, and mind his Book. 

We were no sooner come to the TempIeSimvs, but 
we were surrounded with a Crowd of Watermen, 
offering us their respective Services. Sir Roger after 
having looked about him very attentively, spied one 
with a Wooden Leg, and immediately gave him Orders 
to get his Boat ready. As we were walking towards 
it. You must know^ says Sir Roger, I never make use 
of any body to row me, that has not either lost a Leg 
or an Arm. I would rather hate him a few Strokes of 
his Oar than not employ an honest Man that has been 
wounded in the Queen^s Service. If I was a Lord or 
a Bishop, and kept a Barge, I would not put a Fellow 
in my Livery that had not a Wooden Leg, 

My old Friend, after having seated himself, and 
trimmed the Boat with his Coachman, who, being a 
very sober Man, always serves for Ballast on these 
Occasions, we made the best of our Ways for Vaux- 
Hall. Sir Roger obliged the Waterman to give us 
the History of his right Leg, and hearing that he had 
left it at La Hogue, with many Particulars which 
passed in that glorious Action, the Knight in the 
Triumph of his Heart made several Reflexions on the 
Greatness of the British Nation ; as, that one English- 



156 SIR ROGER AT VAUX-HALL. 

man could beat three FrencJwien ; that we could never 
be in danger of Popery so long as we took care of our 
Fleet ; that the Thames was the noblest River in 
Europe ; that London- Bridge was a greater piece of 
Work, than any of the seven Wonders of the World ; 
with many other honest Prejudices which naturally 
cleave to the Heart of a true Englishman. 

After some short Pause, the old Knight turning about 
his Head twice or thrice, to take a Survey of this great 
Metropolis, bid me observe how thick the City was set 
with Churches, and that there was scarce a single 
Steeple on this side Temple-Bar. A most Heathenish 
Sight ! says Sir Roger : There is no Religion at this 
End of the Town. The fifty new Churches loill very 
much mend the Prospect ; hut Church-work is slow, 
Church-work is slow ! 

I do not remember I have any where mentioned, in 
Sir Roger's Character, his Custom of saluting every 
body that passes by him with a Good-morrow, or a 
Good-nijTht. This the old Man does out of the over- 
flowings of his Humanity, though at the same time it 
renders him so popular among all his Country Neigh- 
bours, that it is thought to have gone a good way in 
making him once or twice Knight of the Shire. He 
cannot forbear this Exercise of Benevolence even in 
Town, when he meets with any one in his morning or 



SIU ROGER AT VAI7X-HALL. 157 

eveninr; Walk. It broke from him to several Boats 
that passed by us upon the Water ; but to the Knight's 
great Surprise, as he gave the Good-night to two or 
three young Fellows a little before our landing, one of 
them, instead of returning the Civility, asked us, what 
queer old Put we had in the Boat, with a great deal of 
the like Thames-'RihaLldYy. Sir Roger seemed a little 
shocked at first, but at length assuming a Face of 
Magistracy, told us. That if he were a Middlesex Jus- 
tice, he icould make such Vagrants know that her 
Majesty''s Subjects were no more to be abused by Water 
than by Land. 

We were now arrived at Spring- Garden, which is 
exquisitely pleasant at this time of the Year. When 
I considered the Fragrancy of the Walks and Bowers, 
with the Choirs of Birds that sung upon the Trees, and 
the loose Tribe of People that walked under their 
Shades, I could not but look upon the Place as a kind 
of Mahometan Paradise. Sir Roger told me it put 
him in mind of a little Coppice by his House in the 
Country, which his Chaplain used to call an Aviary of 
Nightingales. You must understand, says the Knight, 
there is nothing in the World that pleases a Man in 
Love so much as your Nightingale. Ah, Mr. Specta- 
tor ! the many Moon-light Nights that I have walked 
by myself, and thought on the Widow by the Musick of 



15S SIR ROGER AT VAUX-HALL. 

the Nightingale ! He here fetched a deep Sigh, and 
was falling into a Fit of musing, when a Mask, who 
came behind him, gave him a gentle Tap upon the 
Shoulder, and asked him if he would drink a Bottle of 
Mead with her ? But the Knight being startled at so 
unexpected a Familiarity, and displeased to be inter- 
rupted in his Thoughts of the Widow, told her. She 
ivas a wanton Baggage, and bid her go about her 
Business. 

We concluded our Walk with a Glass of Burton- 
Ale, and a Slice of Hung-Beef. When we had done 
eating ourselves, the Knight called a Waiter to him, 
and bid him carry the Remainder to the Waterman 
that had but one Leg. I perceived the Fellow stared 
upon him at the oddness of the Message, and was 
going to be saucy ; upon which I ratified the Knight's 
Commands with a peremptory Look. 



CHAPTER XXV. 

Sir Roger, the Widow, Will Honeycomb, and 
Milton. 

Torva leana Ivpum sequitur, lupus ipse capellam ; 
Florentem cytisiim sequitur lasciva capella. Yirg. 

A S we were at the Club last Night, I observed my 
-^-^ Friend Sir Roger, contrary to his usual Custom, 
sat very silent, and instead of minding what was said 
by the Company, was whistling to himself in a very 
thoughtful Mood, and playing with a Cork. I jogged 
Sir Andrew Freeport who sat between us ; and as 
we were both observing him, we saw the Knight shake 
his Head, and heard him say, to himself, A foolish 
Woman ! I canH believe it. Sir Andrew gave him a 
gentle pat upon the Shoulder, and offered to lay him 
a Bottle of Wine that he was thinking of the Widow. 
My old Frield started, and recovering out of his brown 
Study, told Sir Andrew that once in his Life he had 
been in the right. In short, after some little Hesitation, 
Sir Roger told us in the Fulness of his Heart that he 



160 SIR ROGER, THE WIDOW, 

had just received a Letter from his Steward, which 
acquainted him that his old Rival and Antagonist in 
the Country, Sir David Dundrum, had been making a 
Visit to the Widow. However, says Sir Roger, I can 
never think that she'll have a Man that's half a Year 
older than I am, and a noted Republican into the 
bargain. 

Will HoNEycoMB, who looks upon Love as his 
particular Province, interrupting our Friend with a 
jaunty Laugh ; I thought. Knight, says he, thou hadst 
lived long enough in the World, not to pin thy Happi- 
ness upon one that is a Woman and a Widow. I 
think that without Vanity I may pretend to know as 
much of the Female World as any Man in Great 
Britain, though the chief of my Knowledge consists 
in this, that they are not to be known. Will imme- 
diately, with his usual Fluency, rambled into an Ac- 
count of his own Amours. I am now, says he, upon 
the Verge of Fifty, (though by the way we all knew 
he was turned of Threescore ) You may easily 
guess, continued Will, that I have not lived so long in 
the World without having had some Thoughts of 
settling in it, as the Phrase is. To tell you truly, I 
have several times tried my Fortune that wa}^, though 
I can't much boast of my Success. 

I made my first Addresses to a young Lady in the 



WILL HONEYCOMB, AND MILTON. 161 

Country ; but when I thought things were pretty well 
drawing to a Conclusion, her Father happening to hear 
that I had formerly boarded with a Surgeon, the old 
Put forbid me his House, and within a Fortnight after 
married his Daughter to a Fox-hunter in the Neigh- 
bourhood. 

I made my next Application to a Widow, and at- 
tacked her so briskly, that I thought myself within a 
Fortnight of her. As I waited upon her one Morning, 
she told me, that she intended to keep her Ready 
Money and Jointure in her own Hand, and desired me 
to call upon her Attorney in Lions-Inn, who would 
adjust with me what it was proper for me to add to it. 
I was so rebuffed by this Overture, that I never inquired 
either for her or her Attorney afterwards. 

A few Months after I addressed myself to a young 
Lady who was an only Daughter, and of a good 
Family : I danced with her at several Balls, squeezed 
her by the Hand, said soft things to her, and in short 
made no doubt of her Heart ; and tho' my Fortune 
was not equal to hers, I was in hopes that her fond 
Father would not deny her the Man she had fixed her 
Affections upon. But as I went one Day to the House 
in order to break the matter to him, I found the whole 
Family in Confusion, and heard to my unspeakable 
11 



162 SIR ROGER, THE WIDOW, 

Surprise, that Miss Jenny was that very Morning run 
away with the Butler. 

I then courted a second Widow, and am at a loss to 
this Day how I came to miss her, for she had often 
commended my Person and Behaviour. Her Maid 
indeed told me one Day, that her Mistress had said she 
never saw a Gentleman with such a spindle Pair of 
Legs as Mr. Honeycomb. 

After this I laid Siege to four Heiresses successively, 
and being a handsom young Dog in those Days, quickly 
made a Breach in their Hearts ; but I don't know how 
it came to pass, though I seldom failed of getting the 
Daughters' Consent, I could never in my Life get the 
old People on my side. 

I could give you an Account of a thousand other 
unsuccessful Attempts, particularly of one which I 
made some Years since upon an old Woman, whom I 
had certainly born away with flying Colours, if her 
Relations had not come pouring in to her Assistance 
from all Parts of England ; nay, I believe I should 
have got her at last, had not she been carried off by a 
hard Frost. 

As Will's Transitions are extremely quick, he 
turned from Sir Roger, and applying himself to me, 
told me there was a Passage in the Book I had con- 
sidered last Saturday^ which deserved to be writ in 



WILL HONEYCOMB, AND MILTON. 163 

Letters of Gold ; and taking out a PockeX- Milton, read 
the following Lines, which are part of one of AdanCs 
Speeches to Eve after the Fall. 

' Oh ! why did God, 
Creator wise ! that peopled highest Heaven 
With Spirits masculine, create at last 
This Novelty on Earth, this fair Defect 
Of Nature ? and 7iot fill the World at oyice 
With Men, as Angels, without Feminine ? 
Or find some other way to generate 
Mankind ? This Mischief had riot then hefalVn, 
And more that shall befall, innumerable 
Disturbances on Earth through Female Snares, 
And strait Conjunction with this Sex : for either 
He never shall find out fit Mate ; but such 
As some misfortune brings him, or mistake ; 
Or, whom he wishes most, shall seldom gain 
Through her perverseness ; but shall see her gain'd 
By afar worse : or if she love, withheld 
By Parents ; or his happiest Choice too late 
Shall meet already linked, and Wedlock-bound 
To a fell Adversary, his Hate or Shame ; 
Which infinite Calamity shall cause 
To human Life, and Houshold Peace confound.^ 

Sir Roger listened to this Passage with great At- 
tention, and desiring Mr. Honeycomb to fold down a 
Leaf at the Place, and lend him his Book, the Knight 
put it up in his Pocket, and told us that he would read 
over those Verses again before he went to Bed. 



CHAPTER XXYI. 

Sir Roger passeth away. 
Heu Fietas ! heu prisca Fides ! Virg. 

TTTE last Night received a Piece of ill News at our 
' Club, which very sensibly afflicted every one of 
us. I question not but my Readers themselves will be 
troubled at the hearing of it. To keep them no longer 
in suspense, Sir Roger de Coverley is dead. He 
departed this Life at his Flouse in the Country, after a 
few Weeks' Sickness. Sir Andrew Freeport has a 
Letter from one of his Correspondents in those Parts, 
that informs him the old Man caught a Cold at the 
County-Sessions, as he was very warmly promoting 
an Address of his own penning, in which he suc- 
ceeded according to his Wishes. But this Particular 
comes from a Whig Justice of Peace, who was always 
Sir Roger's Enemy and Antagonist. I have Letters 
both from the Chaplain and Captain Sentry which 
mention nothing of it, but are filled with many Partic- 
ulars to the honour of the good old Man. I have 
likewise a letter from the Butler, who took so much 



SIR ROGER PASSETH AWAY. 165 

care of me last Summer when I was at the Knight's 
House. As my Friend the Butler mentions, in the 
Simplicity of his Heart, several Circumstances the 
others have passed over in silence, I shall give my 
Reader a Copy of his Letter, without any Alteration 
or Diminution. 

' Honoured Sir^ 
ITNOWING that you was my old Master's good 
-'-^ Friend, I could not forbear sending you the 
melancholy News of his Death, which has afflicted 
the whole Country, as well as his poor Servants, who 
loved him, I may say, better than we did our Lives. 
I am afraid he caught his Death the last County- 
Sessions, where he would go to see Justice done to a 
poor Widow Woman, and her Fatherless Children, 
that had been wronged by a neighbouring Gentle- 
men ; for you know. Sir, my good Master was al- 
ways the poor Man's Friend. Upon his coming 
home, the first Complaint he made was, that he had 
lost his Rost-Beef Stomach, not being able to touch a 
Sirloin, which was served up according to custom ; 
and you know he used to take great delight in it. 
From that time forward he grew worse and worse, 
but still kept a good Heart to the last. Indeed we 
were once in great hope of his Recovery, upon a 



166 SIR ROGER PASSETH AWAY. 

' kind Message that was sent him from the Widow 
' Lady whom he had made love to the forty last Years 
' of his Life ; but this only proved a Lightning before 
' Death. He has bequeathed to this Lady, as a token 
' of his Love, a great Pearl Necklace, and a Couple 
' of Silver Bracelets set with Jewels, which belonged 
' to my good old Lady his Mother : He has bequeathed 
' the fine white Gelding, that he used to ride a hunting 
' upon, to his Chaplain, because he thought he would 
' be kind to him, and has left you all his Books. He 
' has, moreover, bequeathed to the Chaplain a very 
' pretty Tenement with good Lands about it. It being 
' a very cold Day when he made his Will, he left for 
' Mourning, to every Man in the Parish, a great Prize 
' Coat, and to every Woman a black Riding-hood. It 
' was a most moving sight to see him take leave of his 
' poor Servants, commending us all for our Fidelity, 
' whilst we were not able to speak a word for weep- 
' ing. As we most of us are grown gray-headed in 

* our dear Master's Service, he has left us Pensions 
' and Legacies, which we may live very comfortably 

* upon, the remaining part of our Days. He has 
' bequeathed a great deal more in Charity, which is 
' not yet come to my Knowledge, and it is perempto- 
' rily said in the Parish, that he has left Money to build 
' a Steeple to the Church ; for he was heard to say 



SIR ROGER PASSETH AWAY. 167 

' some time ago, that if he lived two Years longer, 
' Coverley Church should have a Steeple to it. The 
' Chaplain tells every Body that he made a very good 
' End, and never speaks of him without Tears. He 
' was buried according to his own Directions, among 
Hhe Family of the Coverlets, on the Left Hand 
' of his Father Sir Arthur. The Coffin was carried 
' by six of his Tenants, and the Pall held up by sLx of 
' the Quorum : The whole Parish followed the Corps 
' with heavy Hearts, and in their Mourning Suits, the 
' Men in Frize, and the Women in Riding-hoods. 
' Captain Sentry, my Master's Nephew, has taken 
' possession of the Hall-House, and the whole Estate. 
' When my old Master saw him a litde before his 
' Death, he shook him by the Hand, and wished him 
' Joy of the Estate which was falling to him, desiring 
' him only to make a good Use of it, and to pay the 
' several Legacies and the Gifts of Charity which he 
' told him he had left as Quit-rents upon the Estate. 
' The Captain truly seems a courteous Man, though he 
' says but little. He makes much of those whom my 
' Master loved, and shows great Kindnesses to the old 
' House-dog, that you know my poor Master was so 
' fond of. It would have gone to your Heart to have 
' heard the Moans the dumb Creature made on the Day 
' of my Master's Death. He has never joyed himself 



168 SIR ROGER PASSETH AWAY. 

* since ; no more has any of us. 'Twas the melan- 
' choliest Day for the poor People that ever happened 
' in Worcestershire. This is all from, 

' Honoured Sir, 
' Your most sorrowful Servant, 

' Edward Biscuit.' 

P. S. ' My Master desired, some Weeks before he 
' died, that a Book which comes up to you by the 
' Carrier should be given to Sir Andrew Freeport, in 
' his Name.' 

This Letter, notwithstanding the poor Butler's man- 
ner of writing it, gave us such an Idea of our good 
old Friend, that upon the reading of it there was not a 
dry Eye in the Club. Sir Andrew opening the Book, 
found it to be a Collection of Acts of Parliament. 
There was in particular the Act of Uniformity, with 
some Passages in it marked by Sir Roger's own Hand. 
Sir Andrew found that they related to two or three 
Points, which he had disputed with Sir Roger the last 
time he appeared at the Club. Sir Andrew, who 
would have been merry at such an Incident on another 
Occasion, at the sight of the old Man's Hand-writing 
burst into Tears, and put the Book into his Pocket. 
Captain Sentry informs us, that the Knight has left 
Rings and Mourning for every one in the Club. 



NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 



NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 



The Author's Preface. Page i. 

FROM the Spectator, No. i, dated March 1, 1711-12. 
By Addison. 

Page 3. 1 made a Voyage to Grand Cairo, on purpose to 
take Measure of the Pyramid. A half century's contention 
respecting the exact admeasurement of the Great Pyramid of 
Gizeh was a fair subject for ridicule in spite of Dr. Percy's 
stigma that the satire was ' reprehensible.' Mr. John 
Greaves originated the argument so long before the publica- 
tion of this harmless raillery as 1646, in his Work entitled 
' Pyramidologia,' and it seems to have been carried on with 
burning zeal and wonderful learning to the days of the 
Spectator, although death had removed Greaves from the dis- 
cussion in 1652. In No. 7 the Spectator says, ' I design to 
visit the next masquerade in the same Habit I wore at Grand 
Cairo.' 

Page 4. The Coffee-Houses. There is no Place of gen- 
eral Resort wherein I do not make my Appearance. The 
chief places of resort were coffee and chocolate houses, in 
which some men almost lived, insomuch that whoever wished 



172 NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 

to find a gentleman commonly asked, not where he resided, 
but which coffee-house he frequented ? No decently attired 
idler was excluded, provided he laid down his penny at the 
bar ; but which he could seldom do without struggling 
through the crowd of beaux who fluttered round the lovely 
bar-maid. Here the proud nobleman or country squire were 
not to be distinguished from the genteel thief and daring 
highwayman. ' Pray Sir,' says Aimwell to Gibbet, in Far- 
quhar's Beaux Stratagem, ' han't I seen your face at WiWs 
coffee-house 1 ' The robber's reply is : — ' Yes, Sir ; and 
at White's too.' 

Coffee-houses, from the time of their commencement in 
1652, served instead of newspapers: — they were arencB for 
political discussion. Journalism was then in its infancy : the 
first daily newspaper ( The Daily Courant) was scarcely two 
years old, and was too small to contain much news ; as were 
the other journals then extant. Hence the fiercely contested 
polemics of the period were either waged in single pamphlets 
or in periodicals started to advocate or oppose some par- 
ticular question, and laid down when that was settled. The 
peaceful leading article and mild letter ' to the Editor ' 
had not come into vogue as safety valves for the escape of 
overboiling party zeal ; and the hot blood, roused in public 
rooms to quarrelling pitch, was too often cooled by the 
rapier's point. 

Each coffee-house had its political or literary speciality ; 
and of those enumerated in the present paper, Will's was 
the rendezvous for the wits and poets. It was named after 
William Urwin, its proprietor, and was situated at No. 1, 



NOTES AND ILLUSTKATIONS. 173 

Bow Street, at the corner of Great Russell Street, Covent 
Garden ; the coffee-room was on the first floor, the lower part 
having been occupied as a retail shop. Dryden's patronage 
and frequent appearance made the reputation of the house, 
which was afterwards maintained by other celebrated charac- 
ters, De Foe wrote — about the year 1720 — that 'after 
the play the best company go to Toin's or WiWs coffee- 
house near adjoining ; where there is playing picquet and the 
best conversation till midnight. Here you will see blue 
and green ribbons and stars familiarly, and talking with the 
same freedom, as if they had left their quality and degrees 
of distance at home.' The turn of conversation is happily 
hit off in the Spectator for June 12th, 1712, when a false 
report of the death of Louis XIV. had reached England : — 
' Upon my going into WiWs I found their discourse was 
gone off from the death of the French king to that of Mon- 
sieur Boileau, Racine, Corneille, and several other poets, 
whom they regretted on this occasion, as persons who would 
have obliged the world with very noble elegies on the death 
of so great a prince, and so eminent a patron of learning.' 
It was from WilVs coffee-house that the Taller dated his 
poetry. 

Child's was in St. Paul's Churchyard. Its vicinity to the 
Cathedral and Doctor's Commons, made it the resort of the 
clergy and other ecclesiastical loungers. In one respect 
Child's was superseded by the Chapter in Paternoster Row. 

The St. James's was the Spectator's head-quarters. It 
stood at the end of Pall Mall — of which it commanded a 
perspective view — near to, if not upon the site of what is 



174 NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 

now No. 87, St. James's Street, and close to Ozinda's choc- 
olate-house. These were the great party rallying places : 
' a Whig,' says De Foe, ' would no more go to the Cocoa 
Tree or Ozindas than a Tory would be seen at St. Jameses. ^ 
Swift, however, frequented the latter during his sojourn in 
London, 1710-13; till, fighting in the van of the Tory 
ranks, he could no longer show face there, and was obliged to 
relinquish the society of those literary friends whom, though 
Whigs, he cherished. Up to that time all his letters were 
addressed to the St. Jameses coffee-house, and those from 
Mrs. Johnston (Stella) were enclosed under cover to Addi- 
son. Elliot, who kept the house, acted confidentially for his 
customers as a party agent ; and was on occasions placed on 
a friendly footing with some of his distinguished guests. In 
Swift's Journal to Stella, under the date of Nov. 19, 1710, 
we find the following entry : — ' This evening I christened 
our coffee-man Elliot's child ; when the rogue had a most 
noble supper, and Steele and I sat amongst some scurvy 
company over a bowl of punch.' This must have included 
some of Elliot's more intimate or private friends ; for he 
numbered amongst his customers nearly all the Whig aristoc- 
racy. The Taller, (who dated his politics from the ^S*^. 
Jam"s''s,) enum^^rating the charges he was at to entertain his 
readers, assures them that ' a good observer cannot even 
speak with Kidney [" keeper of the book debts of the out- 
lying customers, and observer of all those who go off without 
paying,"*] without clean linen.' 



* Spectator, No. 24. 



NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 175 

The Spectator, in his 403rd number, gives a graphic pic- 
ture of the company in the coffee-room : — 'I first of all 
called in at St. James''s where I found the whole outward 
room in a buzz of politics. The speculations were but very 
indifferent towards the door, but grew finer as you advanced 
to the upper end of the room, and were so very much im- 
proved by a knot of theorists, who sat in the inner room, 
within the steams of the coffee-pot, that I there heard the 
whole Spanish monarchy disposed of, and all the line of 
Bourbon provided for, in less than a quarter of an hour.' 

The Grecian in Devereux Court derived its name from a 
Greek named Constantino, who introduced a new and im- 
proved method of making coffee, from the land of Epicurus. 
Perhaps from this cause, or from having set up his apparatus 
close to the Temple, he drew the Learned to his rooms. 
' All accounts of Learning,' saith the Taller, ' shall be under 
the Title of the Grecian.^ The alumni appear to have dis- 
puted at a particular table. ' I cannot keep an ingenious 
Man,' continues Bickerstaff, ' to go daily to the Grecian 
without allowing him some plain Spanish to be as able as 
others at the learned Table.' The glory of the Grecian out- 
lasted that of the rest, and it remained a tavern till 1843. 

Jonathan's, in Change Alley, the general mart for stock- 
jobbers, was the precursor of the present Stock Exchange in 
Capel Court. The hero of Mrs. Centlivre's comedy, ' A 
Bold Stroke for a Wife^' performs at Jonathan's his most 
successful deception on the city guardian of his mistress. 

The other coffee-houses will be noticed as they occur in 
the text. 



176 NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 

Page 6. Jt is laid and concerted {as all other Matters of 
Importance are) in, a Club. The word Club as applied to 
convivial meetings, is derived from the Saxon deaf an, to 
divide, ' because,' says Skinner, ' the expenses are divided 
into shares or portions.' 

Clubs were more general in the days of the Spectator than 
perhaps at any other period of our history. Throughout the 
previous half century public discord had dissevered private 
society ; and, at the Restoration, men yearned for fellowship ; 
but as, even yet, political danger lurked under an unguarded 
expression or a rash toast, companions could not be too care- 
fully chosen. Persons therefore whose political opinions and 
private tastes coincided, made a practice of meeting in clubs. 
This principle of congeniality took all manner of odd turns, 
but the political clubs of the time played an important part in 
history. 

The idea of uniting the authors of a periodical in a club — 
though an obvious one — was calculated to bring out spark- 
ling contrasts of character. But it was not successfully 
elaborated. Each personage was greatly dissociated from the 
club in future papers. Hence the faults some critics have 
found with the character of Sir Roger ; for, taken in connec- 
tion with the society, it has not the coherence it would have 
had, if the club scheme had been efficiently developed. But 
viewed separately, what — as the reader of these pages will 
own — can be more harmonious or natural ? 

The eccentric clubs were fruitful sources of satire to the 
Spectator. He is merry on the Mummers'' , the Two-penny , 
the Ugly, the Fighting, the Fringe-Glove, the Hum-drum, 



NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 177 

the Doldrum, the Everlasting, and the Lovers'' clubs ; on 
clubs of fat men, of tall men, of one-eyed men, and of men 
who lived in the same street. This last was a social arrange- 
ment, almost necessary at a time when distant visits were 
impossible at night, not only from the bad condition of the 
streets, but from the ravages of the dastardly ' Mohock Club,' 
of which hereafter. 

Page 6. Those who have a mind to correspond with me may 
direct their Letters to the Spectator at Mr. Bucklei/^s. 

' This day is published 
A paper entitled The Spectator, which will be continued 
every day. Printed for Sam. Buckley at the Dolphin, in 
Little Britain, and sold by A. Baldwin, in Warwick Lane.' 

Daily Courant, March 1st, 1711. 

The above names form the imprint to the Spectator's early 
papers. From No. 18 appears, in addition, ' Charles Lillie 
[perfumer, bookseller and secretary to the Tatlcr's " Court 
of Honour"] at the corner of Beaufort buildings in the 
Strand.' From the date, August 5th, 1712, (No. 449) Jacob 
Tonson's imprint is appended. About that time he removed 
from Gray's Lm Gate to ' the Strand, over against Catherine 
Street.' 

Samuel Buckley had eventually an innocent hand in the 
discontinuance of the Spectator. He was the ' writer and 
printer' of the first daily newspaper — The Daily Courant, 
and having published on the 7th of April, 1712, a memorial 
of the States General, reflecting on the English government, 
12 



178 NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 

he was brought in custody to the bar of the House of Com- 
mons. The upshot was some strong resolutions respecting 
the licentiousness of the press (which had indeed been com- 
mented on at the opening of parliament in the Queen's 
Speech) and the imposition of the halfpenny stamp on period- 
icals. To this addition to the price of the Spectator is 
attributed its downfall. 

Chap. I. Sir Roger and the Club. 

No. 2. Friday, March 2, 1711-12. By Steele. 

Page 9. The first of our Society is a Gentleman of 
Worcestershire of ancient Descent, a Baronet, his Name is 
Sir Roger de Coverley. Whenever any striking individu- 
ality appears in print, the public love to suppose that, instead 
of being the embodied representative of a class, it is an actual 
portrait. A thousand conjectures were afloat as to the origi- 
nal of Sir Roger de Coverley, at the time and long after the 
Spectator's papers were in current circulation. These were 
revived by a passage in the preface to Budgell's Theophrastus, 
in which he asserted in general terms that most of the char- 
acters in the Spectator were conspicuously known. It was 
not however till 1783, when Tyers named Sir John Packing- 
ton of West wood, Worcestershire, that any prototype to Sir 
Roger was definitely pointed out. 

Tyers's assertion is not tenable. Except that Sir Roger 
and Sir John were both baronets and lived in Worcestershire, 
each presents few points of similitude to the other : — Sir 
Roger was a disappointed bachelor ; Sir John was twice 



NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 179 

married: Sir Roger, although more than once returned 
knight of the shire, was not an ardent politician ; Sir John 
was, and sate for his native county in every parhament save 
one from his majority till his death. Westwood House — 
' in the middle of a wood that is cut into twelve large ridings ; 
the whole encompassed with a park of six or seven miles,' * 
— bears no greater resemblance to the description of Coverley 
Hall than the scores of Country houses which have wood 
about them. Sir Roger is neither litigant nor lawyer, 
despite the universal applause bestowed by the Quarter ses- 
sion on his exposition of ' a passage in the game-act : ' Sir 
John was a barrister, and besides having been Recorder for 
the city of Worcester, proved himself so powerful a plain- 
tiff, that he ousted the then Bishop of Worcester from his 
place of Royal Almoner for interfering in the County elec- 
tion. 

The account of the Spectator and each member of his club 
was most likely fictitious ; for the Tatler having been be- 
trayed into personalities gave such grave offence, that Steele 
determined not to fall again into a like error. Had indeed 
the originals of Sir Roger and his club-companions existed 
among, as Budgell asserts, the ' conspicuous ' characters of 
the day, literary history would assuredly have revealed them. 
But a better witness than Budgell testifies to the reverse. 
The Spectator emphatically disclaims personality in various 
passages : — In 262 he says, ' When I place an imaginary 
Name at the Head of a Character, I examine every Syllable, 



* Nash's Worcestershire. 



180 NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 

every Letter of it, that it may not bear any resemblance to 
one that is Real: ' in another place, — ' I would not make 
myself merry with a Piece of Pasteboard that is invested with 
a Public Character.' 

Page 9. ^25 Great Grandfather ivas Inventor of that 
famous Country-Dance called after him. The real sponsor 
to the joyous conclusion of every ball has only been recently 
revealed after the most vigilant research. An autograph 
account by Ralph Thoresby, of the family of Calverley of 
Calverley in Yorkshire, dated 1717, and which is now in the 
possession of Sir W. Calverley Trevelyan, states that the 
tune of Roger a Calverley was named after Sir Roger of Cal- 
verley, who lived in the time of Richard the Fiist. This 
Knight, according to the custom of that period, kept min- 
strels, who took the name from their office of harper. 
Their descendants possessed lands in the neighbourhood of 
Calverley, called Harpersroids and Harper^s Spring. * The 
seal of this Sir Roger, appended to one of his charters, is 
large, with a chevalier on horseback.' 

The earliest printed copy of the tune which has yet been 
traced is in 'a choice collection to a ground for a treble 
violin,' by J. Playford, 1685. It appears again in 1695 in 
H. Playford's ' Dancing Master.' Mr. Chappell, author of 
the elaborate work on English Melodies, believes it to have 
been a hornpipe. That it was popular about the Spectator's 
time is shown from a passage in a Satirical history of Powel 
the Puppet man (1715) : — ' Upon the preludes being ended 
each party fell to bawling and calling for particular tunes. 
The hobnailed fellows, whose breeches and lungs seemed to 



NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. l8l 

be of the same leather, cry'd out for ' Cheshire Rounds,' 
^ Roger of Coverley,^ 'Joan's placket,' and 'Northern 
Nancy.' 

Steele owned that the notion of adapting the name to the 
good genial old knight, originated with Swift. 

Page 10. Wlien in Town he lives in Soho Square. Sir 
Roger had doubtless chosen this fashionable locality in the 
' fine gentleman ' era of his career. We shall presently see, 
that on his subsequent visits to Town he changed his lodg- 
ings to humbler neighbourhoods. The splendour of Soho 
Square was only dawning, when Foreign Princes were taken 
to see Bloomsbury Square as one of the wonders of England. 
In 1681, the former had no more than eight residences in it, 
and the palace of the unfortunate Duke of Monmouth filled 
up the entire South side. During Sir Roger's supposed resi- 
dence in Soho (then also called King's) Square he had for a 
neighbour Bishop Burnet. Only a few years later it lost 
caste ; for by 1717 we find from Walpole's Anecdotes of 
Painting that Monmouth House had been converted into 
Auction Rooms. 

Sir Roger changed his residence at each subsequent visit 
to London. The Spectator in his 335th Number lodges him 
in Norfolk Street, Strand, and in No. 410 in Bow Street, 
Covent Garden. 

Page 10. Kicked Bully Dawson. Dawson was a swag- 
gering gentleman about Town, when Etheridge and Roches- 
ter were in full vogue. One of the Manuscript notes, by 
Oldys, upon the margins of the copy of Langbaine's account 



182 NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 

of the English Dramatic Poets, in the British Museum, men- 
tions him thus : — 

' The character of Captain Hackman in this Comedy 
[Shadwell's " Squire of Alsatia"] was drawn as I have been 
told by old John Bowman the player, to expose Bully 
Dawson, a noted sharper, swaggerer, and debauchee about 
Town, especially in Blackfriars and its infamous purlieus.' 

Page 12. He has his Shoes rubbed and his Periwig 
powdered at the Barher^s as you go into the Rose. The Rose 
stood at the end of a passage in Russell Street, adjoining the 
theatre which then, be it remembered, faced Drury Lane. It 
was here that on the 12th November 1712, the seconds on 
either side arranged the duel fought the next day by the Duke 
of Hamilton and Lord Mohun, in which both were killed. 

Page 12. Sir Andrew Freeport. ' To Sir Roger who as a 
country gentleman appears to be a Tory ; or, as it is generally 
expressed, an adherent to the landed interest, is opposed Sir 
Andrew Freeport, a new man and a wealthy merchant, 
zealous for the money 'd interest, and a Whig. Of this con- 
trariety of opinions more consequences were at first intended 
than coald be produced when the resolution was taken to 
exclude party from the paper.' Dr. Johnson's Life of 
Addison. 

No one has ventured to name originals either for the Tem- 
plar or Sir Andrew Freeport. 

Page 13. Captain Sentry. This character, heir to Sir 
Roger, is said — with no more probability than attaches to 
the imagined origin of the others — to have been copied from 
Col. Kempenfeldt, father of the Admiral who was drowned 



NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 183 

in the Royal George^ when it went down at Spithead in 1782. 
The conjecture probably had no other foundation — a very 
frail one — than a eulogium on the colonel's chaiacter in 
Captain Sentry's letter to the club announcing his induction 
into Sir Roger's estate, and which forms the last of the 
Coverley papers. 

Page 15. Will Honeycomb. Col. Cleland of the Life 
Guards has been named as the real person here described : 
but as in the former instances the supposition is ill supported. 

Chap. II. Coverley Hall. 

No. 106. Monday, July 2, 1711. By Addison. 

Page 2 1 . He was afraid of being insulted with Latin and 
Greek at his own Table. The literary acquirements of the 
Squirearchy of Sir Roger's era were few. At a time not 
long antecedent, ' an esquire passed for a great scholar if 
Hudibras, and Baker's Chronicle, Tarleton's Jests, and the 
Seven Champions of Christendom lay in his hall window 
among angling rods and fishing lines.' * But that Sir Roger 
may appear in this, as in other respects, above the average of 
his order, there is in Coverley Hall a library rich in ' divinity 
and MS. household receipts.' Sir Roger too had drawn 
many observations together out of his reading in Baker's 
Chronicle, and other authors ' who always lie in his Hall 
window ; ' and, however limited his own classic lore, it is 
certain that both in love and in friendship he displayed strong 

* Macauiay's History of England. 



184 NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 

literary sympathies. The perverse Widow whose cruelty 
darkened his whole existence, was a ' reading lady,' a 'des- 
perate scholar,' and in argument ' as learned as the best 
philosopher in Europe.' One who. when in the country, 
' does not run into dairies, but reads upon the nature of plants 
— has a glass hive and comes into the garden out of books to 
see them work.' In his friendship again. Sir Roger was all 
for learning. Besides the Spectator, — to whom he eventually 
bequeathed his books — he indulged a Platonic admiration for 
Leonora, a Widow, formerly a celebrated beauty, and still a 
very lovely woman — who ' turned all the passion of her sex 
into a love of books and retirement.' 

Chap. III. The Coverley Household. 

No. 107. Tuesday, July 3, 1711. By Steele, 
Page 24. The general Corruption of Manners in Servants 
is owing to the Conduct of Masters. The account of Sir 
Roger's domestics, in which his benevolence is made so 
vividly to beam forth, was ' intended as a gentle admonition 
to thankless masters,' whose harshness and brutality were not 
exaggerated in the fictions and plays of the time. It was 
quite usual for gentlemen to cane offending footmen, and to 
assail female servants with the coarsest abuse. On the other 
side, dependants took their revenge to the fullest extent; — 
sometimes by subtle artifice, at others by reckless dissipation 
and bold dishonesty. Newspapers, and criminal records, 
prove that Dean Swift's ' Directions to Servants ' was not an 
imaginative satire ; but that every word was founded on fact. 



NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 185 

Indeed some of the experiences from which it was drawn 
were manifestly derived from his own drinking, cheating-, and 
cringing man, Patrick. In the 88th number of the Spectator 
Philo-Britannicus complains that although there is no place 
wherein servants labour less than in England, yet they are 
nowhere ' so little respectful, more wasteful, more negligent, 
or where they so frequently change masters.' 

That most of the vices of servants were due to the ill- 
conduct of masters — which the example of Sir Roger in this 
chapter is meant in all kindliness to expose and correct — the 
Spectator points out in many pages; but, especially, in his 
commentary on the letter of Philo-Britannicus. ' All depen- 
dants,' he observes, ' run in some measure into the Measures 
and Behaviour of those whom they serve ' — a fact which he 
humorously illustrates thus : — 

' Falling in the other day at a victualling-house near the 
House of Peers, I heard the maid come down and tell ihe 
landlady at the bar, that my Lord Bishop swore he would 
throw her out at window if she did not bring up more mild 
beer, and that my Lord Duke would have a double mug of 
purl. My surprise was increased in hearing loud and rustic 
voices speak and answer to each other upon the public affairs 
by the names of the most illustrious of our nobility ; till of a 
sudden one came running in, and cried the House was rising. 
Down came all the company together, and away : The ale- 
house was immediately filled with clamour, and scoring one 
mug to the Marquis of such a place, oil and vinegar to such 
an Earl, three quarts to my new Lord for wetting his title, 
and so forth. It is a thin^ too notorious to mention the 



186 NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 

crowds of servants, and their insolence, near the courts of 
justice, and the stairs towards the supreme assembly, where 
there is an universal mockery of all order, such riotous 
( amour and licentious confusion, that one would think the 
whole nation lived in jest, and there were no such thing as 
rule and distinction among us.' 

No. 96 of the Spectator and No. 87 of the Guardian are 
filled with the same subject. The short sketch, which ends 
the latter paper, of Lycurgus, ' the Banker, the Council, and 
Parent of all his numerous Dependants,' is a miniature copy 
of Sir Roger by the same artist. 

Various attempts were made to reform domestics ; and 
among them we find, in the first issue of the Spectator, (No. 
224) the advertisement of a society for the encouragement of 
good servants ' at the office in Ironmonger Lane. The 
method,' continues the advertisement, ' has hitherto had very 
good efl^ects, the benefits not being receivable without dutiful 
behaviour of the servants, and a good character from their 
master.' 

Chap. TV. The Coverley Guest. 

No. 108. Wednesday, July 4, 1711. By Addison. 

Page 31. Will Wimble is younger Brother to a Baronet, 
and descended of the ancient Family of th Wimbles. This 
delineation, li e the rest of the Spectator's prominent char- 
acters, is too like life to have escaped the imputation of 
having been drawn from it. The received story is, that 
Will Wimble was a Mr. Thomas Morecraft, younger son of 



NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 187 

a Yorkshire baronet. Steele knew this gentleman in early 
life and introduced him to Addison, by whose bounty he was 
for some time supported ; for, though excelling in such small 
and profitless arts as are attributed to Will Wimble, he had 
not the ingenuity to gain his own livelihood. When Addison 
died, Mr. Morecraft went to Ireland to his friend the Bishop 
of Kildare, at whose house in Fish Street, Dublin, he died 
in 1741. 

The attentive reader of the Toiler will find in it the germ 
of many of the characters in the Spectator — an additional 
argument against their having been drawn from actual indi- 
viduals. The honourable Mr. Thomas Gules, who indicted 
Peter Plum in the Court of Honour for taking the wall of 
him, {Tatler, No. 256) will at once be recognised as the 
prototype of Will Wimble. ' The prosecutor alleged that 
he was the Cadet of a very ancient family ; and that according 
to the principles of all the younger brothers of the said family, 
he had never sullied himself with business ; but had chosen 
rather to starve like a man of honour, than do anything 
beneath his quality. He produced several witnesses that he 
had never employed himself beyond the twisting of a whip, 
or the making of a pair of nutcrackers, in which he only 
worked for his diversion, in order to make a present now and 
then to his friends.' 

Chap. V. The Coverley Lineage. 

No. 109. Thursday, July 5, 1711. By Steele. 

Page 37. He was the last Man that won a Pnze in the 



188 NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 

Tilt Yard. * * * I do not know but it might he exactly where 
the Coffee-house is now. 

* South from Charing Cross, on the right hand, in Stow's 
time, were divers handsome houses lately built before the 
park ; then a large tilt yard for noblemen and others to exer- 
cise themselves in justing, turneying, and fighting at the 
barriers.'* One of these 'handsome houses' afterwards 
became Jenny Man's ' Tilt Yard Coffee House ' in White- 
hall, upon the site now occupied by the Paymaster General's 
office. It was the resort of military officers, until supplanted 
by Slaughter's in St. Martin's Lane ; which more recently 
was, in its turn, ruined by the military clubs. The Spectator 
states elsewhere that the mock military also frequented the 
Tilt Yard Coffee House — fellows who figured in laced hats, 
black cockades, and scarlet suits, and who manfully pulled 
the noses of quiet citizens who wore not swords. 

Page 38. Whereas the Ladies now walk as if they were in 
a Go-Cart. The hooped petticoat was revived, not long be- 
fore the date of this paper, by a mantua-maker named Selby. 
Against it keen war was waged in the Spectator. No. 127 
is wholly devoted to the subject ; Sir Roger being incidentally 
enlisted as an ally. 

It hath ever been considered a foible of the fair sex to run 
into extremes; and, while the promenade costume of that 
day (and indeed of scores of succeeding years) was more 
ample than the present crowded state of population would 

* The Edition of Stoio (Folio 1720) by Seymour, otherwise J. 
Mottley, the compiler of Joe Miller's Jest Book. 






NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 189 

allow, the equestrian habit appears to have been tightened 
into a close imitation of male habiliments. — ' I remember 
when I was at my friend Sir Roger de Coverley's,' says 
the Spectator, (July 18, 1712,) ' about this time twelvemonth, 
an equestrian lady of this order appeared upon the plains 
which lie at a distance from his house. I was at that time 
walking- in the fields with my old friend ; and as his tenants 
ran out on every side to see so strange a sight. Sir Roger 
asked one of them who came by us what it was ? To which 
the country fellow replied, 'Tis a gentlewoman, saving your 
worship's presence, in a coat and hat. This produced a great 
deal of mirth at the knight's house, where we had a story at 
the same time of another of his tenants, who meeting this 
gentleman-like lady on the highway, was asked by her 
whether that was Coverley-Hall, the honest man seeing only 
the male part of the querist, replied. Yes, Sir ; but upon the 
second question, luhether Sir Roger de Coverley loas a mar- 
ried man, having dropped his eye upon the petticoat, he 
changed his notes into JVb, Madam.'' 

Chap. YI. The Coverley Ghost. 

No. 110. Friday, July 6, 1711. By Addison. 

Page 43. Feedeth the young Ravens that call vpon Him. 
' Who giveth fodder unto the cattle ; and feedeth the young 
ravens that call upon Him.' — Psalm cxlvii. 9. 

Page 45. Mr. Locke, in his Chapter of the Association of 
Ideas. — Essay on Human Understanding, Book ii. chap. 33, 
section 10. 



190 NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 



Chap. VII. The Coverlet Sabbath. 

No. 112. Monday, July 9, 1711. By Addison. 

Page 51. As soon os the Sermon is finished, nobody pre- 
sumes to stir till Sir Roger is gone out of the Church. The 
church close to which Addison was born, and where his 
father ministered, may have supplied some of the traits to the 
exquisite picture of a rural Sabbath which this chapter 
presents. 

The parish church of Milston is a modest edifice, situated 
in a combe or hollow of the Wiltshire downs, about tw° 
miles north-west of Amesbury. In the parsonage hous3 — 
now an honoured ruin — on the 1st of May, 1672, Joseph 
Addison was born. It is only separated from the grave-yard 
by a hawthorn fence, and must have been, when inhabited, 
the beau ideal of a country parsonage. It has a spacious 
garden, rich glebe, and commands a pretty view, bounded by 
the hill on which stands the church of Durrington. 

Milston church remains nearly in the same state, as, during 
the first twelve years of his life which Addison passed under 
its shadow. As no benevolent parishioner took the hint con- 
veyed in Sir Roger's will, it is still without tower or steeple ; 
the belfry being nothing more than a small louvered shed. 
Within, the church is partitioned off by tall worm-eaten pews, 
and is scarcely capable of holding a hundred persons. At 
the east end stands the communion table, ' railed in.' It was 
once lighted by a stained glass windovv ; but of this it was 
deprived by the cupidity of a deceased incumbent. The same 



NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 191 

person was guilty of a worse act : — To oblige a friend — ' a 
collector ' — he actually tore out the leaf of the parish regis- 
ter which contained the entry of Joseph Addison's birth. 

Milston Church does not display the texts of Scripture 
attributed to the Coverley edifice. If any existed when 
Addison wrote, they must have been since effaced by white 
wash. 

Chap. VIII. Sir Roger in Love. 

No, 113. Tuesday, July 10, 1711. By Steele. 

Page 60. The Widow is the secret Cause of all that Incon- 
sistency which appears in some Parts of my Friend^s Dis- 
course. The notion that the perverse widow had a living, 
charming, provoking, original, has been more prevalent and 
better supported than that respecting any of the rest of the 
Coverley characters. Although a mere outline, — hinted 
rather than delineated amidst the picturesque group of last 
century figures — she is so suggestively shadowed forth that 
the reader himself insensibly vivifies the outline, feels her 
ascendency and doubles his pity for her kind-hearted victim. 
* The dignity of her aspect, the composure of her motion,' 
and the polish of her repartee — heightened by the foil of 
her spiteful confidant — make us participate in Sir Roger's 
awe; and, while we sympathize with his ardent admiration, 
we tremble for the hapless presumption that aspires to ' the 
finest Hand of any Woman in the World.' — Her subtlety 
was unbounded. No coquette commands success who, be- 
sides varied resources, can. lot ply her art with the chastest 



192 NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 

dexterity ; and the Widow's omnipotence was attained less 
by her personal charms and mental graces, than by the deli- 
cacy of her lures, and the nice discrimination with which they 
were spread. 

These faint but variegated tints are so truthfully blended 
in the Widow, that not only general readers, but acute critics 
have believed, that nothing short of the minutest experience 
of an equally desperate suit to an equally coy and fascinating 
original, could have inspired and executed the likeness. 
Both Addison and Steele had suffered from perverse Widows; 
and who knows but this ' confluence of congenial sentiment ' 
springing from a like source was one cause of these differ- 
ently constituted men being long united in friendship ? 

The tantalizing dominion under which Addison suffered 
when the Coverley papers were in progress, was exercised by 
the Countess Dowager of Warwick, Vv^hom he was anxiously 
courting ; ' perhaps,' says Dr. Johnson, ' with behaviour not 
very unlike that of Sir Roger to his disdainful widow.' The 
result, though different, was not happier than Sir Roger's 
destiny. Not till four years after the Coverley papers had 
been finished did Addison succeed in his suit. ' On the 2nd 
August, 1716,' continues the biographer of the poets, ' he 
married the Countess, on terms much like those on which a 
Turkish Princess is espoused ; to whom the Sultan is re- 
ported to pronounce, "Daughter, I give thee this man for thy 
slave ! " ' This marriage was only a change from one sort 
of unhappiness to another, — from the intermittent vexations 
of a slighted lover, to the chronic miseries of an ill-matched 
husband. 



NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 193 

Probability, liowever, rejects Lady Warwick as the model 
we seek. To find it we must, it is said, turn to Steele's 
tormentress. Addison's sufferings were in full force when 
the sketch was made ; Steele's were past. Addison's tor- 
tures were too real and operative for the unchecked flow of 
that genial humour — for that fine tolerance of the Widow's 
cruelty — which pervades every allusion to her : Steele's 
pains had, on the contrary, been first assuaged by time and 
then, let us hope, extinguished by matrimony with another — 
and another. While therefore experience had made him 
master of a Widow's arts, the retrospect of what he had 
suffered from them was too remote to darken the shadows, or 
to sour the expression of the portrait. Hence it is his signa- 
ture that appears to this paper, and his Widow who is said 
to have inspired them. 

The information on which this belief is grounded is derived 
from Chalmers through Archdeacon Nares, to whom it was 
communicated by the Rev. Duke Yonge of Plympton in 
Devonshire. ' My attention,' says the reverend gentleman, 
* was first drawn to this subject by a very vague tradition in 
the family of Sir Thomas Crawley Boevey, of Flaxley Ab- 
bey in Gloucestershire, that Mrs. Catherine Boevey, widow 
of William Boevey, Esq., and who died January 21, 1726, 
was the original from w^hence the picture of the perverse 
widow in the Spectator was drawn. She was left a widow 
at the early age of 22, and by her portrait (now at Flaxley 
Abbey, and drawn at a more advanced period of her life) ap- 
pears to have been a woman of a handsome, dignified figure, 
13 



194 NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 

as she is described to have been in the 113th No. of the 
Spectator. She was a personage well known and much 
distinguished in her day, and is described very respectably in 
the New Atalantis, under the name of Portia. From these 
facts I was induced to examine whether any internal evidence 
could be traced in the Spectator to justify the tradition. The 
result of that enquiry is as follows : — 

' The papers in the Spectator which give the description of 
the widow, were certainly written by Steele, and that Mrs. 
Boevey was well known to Steele, and held by him in high 
estimation, is equally certain. He dedicates the three vol- 
umes of the " Lady's Library " to three different ladies, 
Lady Burlington, Mrs. Boevey, and Mrs. Steele ; he describes 
each of them in terms of the highest commendation, but each 
of them is distinguished by very discriminating characteristics. 
However exalted the characters of Lady Burlington, or Mrs. 
Steele, there is not one word in the dedication to either which 
corresponds to the character of the widow ; but the characters 
of Mrs. Boevey and the Widow are drawn with marks of 
very striking coincidence. No, 113 of the Spectator, as far 
as it relates to the Widow, is almost a parody on the charac- 
ter of Mrs. Boevey, as shown in the dedication. Sir Roger 
tells his friend that she is a reading lady, and that her dis- 
course was as learned as the best philosopher could possibly 
make. She reads upon the nature of plants, and understands 
everything. Li the dedication Steele says, " instead of as- 
semblies and conversations, books and solitude have been your 
choice : you have charms of your own sex, and knowledge 
not inferior to the most learned of ours." In No. 118, " her 



NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 195 

superior merit is such," says Sir Roger, " that I cannot ap- 
proach her without awe, my heart is checked by too much 
esteem." Dedication. "Your person and fortune equally 
raise the admiration and awe of our whole sex." 

' She is described as having a Confidant, as the Knight 
calls her, to whom he expresses a peculiar aversion. No. 118 
being chiefly on that subject. " Of all persons," says the 
good old Knight, " be sure to set a mark on confidants." I 
know not whether the lady was deserving of the Knight's 
reprobation, but Mrs. Boevey certainly had a female friend of 
this desciiption, of the name of Pope, who lived with her 
more than forty years, whom she left executrix, and who it is 
believed in the family did not execute her office in the most 
liberal manner.' 

The communication goes on to state that Mrs. Boevey's 
residence, Flaxley Abbey, was not far from the borders of 
Worcestershire ; but that there was no tradition in the family 
of her having had such a law-suit as is described by Sir 
Roger. Indeed, a reference to dates shows such a circum- 
stance to have been impossible, unless the phenomenon of a 
widow of nine years old could be credited. Mr. Boevey 
died in 1691, when his wife was twenty-two; now as the 
Spectator fixed the old Knight's age at fifty-six, and as Sir 
Roger himself affirms that the Widow first ' cast her be- 
witching eye upon him ' in his twenty-third year, that fatal 
glance must have flashed in 1678, when Mrs. Boevey was in 
her girlhood. But this weighs not a feather in the scale of 
evidence ; no true artist copies every trait of his subject, and 
the verisimilitude is not diminished because the Gloucestershire 



196 NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 

enslaver was younger and not so litigious as the Worcester- 
shire enchantress. 

Mrs. Boevey died January 21, 1726-7 in her 57th year, 
and was buried in the family vault at Flaxley with an inscrip- 
tion on the walls of the chapel to her memory. There is 
also a monument to her in Westminster Abbey, erected by 
her executrix. 

Sir Roger's Widow will never die. 

Chap. IX. The Coverley Economy. 

No. 114. Wednesday, July 11, 1711. By Steele. 

Page 64. He would save four shillings in the Pound. The 
land tax ; which from 1689 was continued by annual enact- 
ments, till Lowndes's act fixed it at 4s. in the pound. Gay 
addressed an epistle in verse ' to my ingenious and worthy 
friend William Lowndes, Esq., author of the celebrated 
treatise in folio called the land tax bill.' Some of the lines 
run thus : — 

' Thy copious Preamble so smoothly runs. 
Taxes no more appear like Legal Duns, 
Lords, Knights, and Squires the Assessor's Power obey ; 
We read with Pleasure though with Pain we pay.' 

' Poets of Old had such a wondrous Power, 
That with their verses they could raise a tower ; 
But, in thy Prose, a greater Force is found — 
What Poet ever raised Three Thousand Pound? ' 

In 1799 the land tax was made perpetual. 



1 



NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 197 

Chap. X. The Coverley Hunt. 

Nos. 115 and 116. Friday July 13, and Saturday 14, 
1711. The former paper is by Addison, the latter by Eustace 
Budgell. 

Page 67. Such a system of Tubes and Glands as has been 
before mentioned: — viz. in the Commencement of No. 115. 
' I consider the Body as a system of Tubes and Glands, or to 
use a more Rustic Phrase, a Bundle of Pipes and Strainers, 
fitted to one another after so wonderful a manner as to make 
a proper Engine for the Soul to work with.' 

Page 69. His stable doors are patched with Noses that be- 
longed to Foxes of the Knighfs own hunting down, x^lthough 
the Spectator advocated in this, and other pages, moderate 
indulgence in the Sports of the Field, the excessive passion 
of Country Gentlemen for them, to the exclusion of more 
intellectual pastimes, he elsewhere deplores. In a later 
volume he quotes a saying that the curse fulminated by Goliah 
having missed David, had rested on the modern Squire : — 'I 
will give thee to the fowls of the air, and to the beasts of the 
field.' The Country Gentleman was respected by his neigh- 
bours, less for morality or intellect, than for the number of 
Foxes' noses he could show nailed to his stables and barns. 

The sedentary, though assuredly less healthful and respect- 
able games and pastimes introduced by Charles the Second 
and his followers from abroad, had not, even in Queen Anne's 
day, become so thoroughly naturalized as they were after- 
wards ; and ladies keenly participated in the sports of the 
field. The Queen herself followed the hounds in a chaise 



198 NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 

with one horse, ' which ' says Swift ' she drives herself; and 
drives furiously, like Jehu ; and is a mighty hunter, like 
Nimrod.' She was, if Stella's journalist did not exaggerate, 
quite equal to runs even longer than those performed by the 
Coverley hounds ; for, on the 7th August, 1711, she drove 
before dinner five and forty miles after a stag. 

Page 70. Sir Roger has disposed of his Beagles and got a 
pack of Stop-hounds. We infer from Blaine's Rural Sports, 
that when one of these hounds found the scent, he gave 
notice of his good fortune by deliberately squatting to impart 
more effect to his deep tones, and to get wind for a fresh 
start. 

Page 74. The Huntsman threw down his pole before the 
Dogs. The undrained, uncultivated condition of the coun- 
try in Sir Roger's days, made hunting on horseback by no 
means so easy as it is at present. The master of the pack 
therefore could follow straighter over bogs, morasses, and 
ditches, on foot, than the squire could on horseback. To 
assist him in leaping, the pedestrian hunter used a pole. 
Some of the leaps taken in this manner would surprise an 
equestrian huntsman of the present day. 

Page 71. Sir Roger is so keen at this Sport, that he has 
been out almost ecery Day since I came here. The Spectator 
arrived at Coverley Hall on one of the last days of June, and 
the hunt described in the paper dated as above is said to have 
taken place 'yesterday.' Mr. Budgell — who was the son 
of a Devonshire esquire — ought to have known better than 
to make Sir Roger indulge in his favourite sport so decidedly 



•^ 



NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 199 

out of season. It is a wonder how so grave a mistake 
escaped editorial revision. 

Page 75. The Lines out of Mr. Dryden — occur in ' An 
Epistle to his kinsman, J. Dryden, Esquire, of Cliesterton.' 

Chap. XL The Coverley "Witch. 

No. 117. Saturday, July 14, 1711. By Addison. 

Page 77. The following description in Olway. The lines 
quoted in the text are from the second Act of the Orphan. 

Page 86. I hear there is scarce a Village in England that 
has not a Moll White. The belief in witchcraft was in 
Anne's reign something more than merely popular. The 
act of James (Anno : 1. cap. 12) was in full force. By it 
death was decreed to whoever dealt with evil or wicked 
spirits, or invoked them whereby any persons were killed or 
lamed ; or discovered where anything was hidden, or pro- 
voked unlawful love, &c. Under this law two women were 
executed at Northampton just before the Spectator began to 
be published ; and, not long after (1716), a Mrs Hicks and 
her daughter were hanged at Huntingdon for selling their 
souls to the devil, making their neighbours vomit pins, rais- 
ing a storm so that a certain ship was ' almost ' lost, and a 
variety of other impossible crimes. By 1736, these super- 
stitions abated; the Witch Act had become dormant; and, 
on an ignorant person attempting in that year to enforce it 
against an old woman in Surrey, it was repealed (10th 
Geo. 11.) 



200 NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 

Chap. XII. The Coverley Love Match 
Spectator, No. 118. Monday, July 16, 1711. By Steele. 

Chap. XIII. The Coverley Etiquette. 

No. 119. Tuesday, July 17, 1711. By Addison. 

Page 93. The Women in many farts are still trying to 
vie with each other in the Height of their Head-dresses. This, 
at the date of the present paper, was being- decidedly ' behind 
the fashion : ' for in 1711 the mode changed. Still the pro- 
vincials had their excuses, for in No. 98, the Spectator 
affirms that there is no such variable thing in nature as a 
lady's head-dress : ' Within my own Memory I have known 
it rise and fall above thirty Degrees. About ten years ago 
it shot up to a very great height, insomuch that the female 
part of our species were much taller than men. The women 
were of such an enormous stature that we appeared as Grass- 
hoppers before them. At present the whole sex is in a 
manner dwarfed and shrunk into a Race of Beauties that 
seems almost another species. I remember several ladies, 
who were once very near seven foot high, that at present 
want some inches of five : how they came to be thus curtailed 
I cannot learn.' 

Besides the numerous papers devoted to women's attire, 
the whole of No. 265 is a satire on the single subject of 
head-dresses. This frequent recurrence to the small absurd- 
ities of female fashion is said to have damaged the prosperity 
of the Spectator. Soon after the appearance of the above 



NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 201 

cited number, Swift wriles impatiently in his Journal, ' I 
will not meddle with the Spectator : let him fair-sex it to the 
world's end.' 

Chap. XIY. The Coverley Ducks. 

Nos. 120 and 1-21. Wednesday, July 18th, and Thursday, 
19th, 1711. By Addison. 

Chap. XV. Sir Roger on the Bench. 

Spectator, No. 122. Friday, July 20th, 1711. By Addison. 

Page 101. He is just within the Game Act. The 3rd of 
James the First, chap. 14, clause v , provides that if any 
person who has not real property producing forty pounds per 
Ann., or who has not two hundred pounds worth of goods 
and chattels, shall presume to shoot game ; ' Then any per- 
son having lands, tenements, or hereditaments, of the clear 
yearly value of one hundred pounds a year, may take from 
the person or possession of such malefactor or malefactors, 
and to his own use forever keep, such guns, bows, cross- 
bows, buckstalls, engine-hays, nets, ferrets, and coney dogs, 
&c.' This amiable enactment — which permitted a one 
hundred pound freeholder to become in his single person, 
accuser, witness, judge, jury, and executioner ; and which 
made an equally respectable but poorer man who shot a hare 
a ' malefactor ' — was the law of the land even so lately as 
1827, for it was only repealed by the 7th and 8th Geo. IV. 
chap. 27. 



202 NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 



Chap. XVI. The Story of an Heir. 

No. 123. Saturday, July 21, 1711. By Addison. 

Page 107. Eudoxus and Leontiae began the world loilh 
small estates. 

' Being very well pleased with this day's Spectator, (writes 
Mr. Addison to Mr. Wortley, under date "July 21, 1711,") 
I cannot forbear sending you one of them, and desiring your 
opinion of the story in it. When you have a son I shall be 
glad to be his Leontine, as my circumstances will probably 
be like his I have within this twelve-month lost a place of 
2000/. per annum, an estate in the Indies of 14,000/., and 
what is worse than all the rest, my mistress. Hear this and 
wonder at my philosophy. I find they are going to take 
away my Irish place from me too : to which I must add, that 
I have just resigned my fellowship, and that the stocks sink 
every day. If you have any hints or subjects, pray send me 
up a paper full. I long to talk an evening with you. I 
believe I shall not go to Ireland this summer, and perhaps 
would pass a month with you, if I knew where. Lady 
Bellasis is very much your humble servant. Dick Steele 
and I often remember you.' 

Of the estate in ' The Indies ' — referred to also by Swift 
— no intelligible notice has been found. The mistress was 
probably the perverse widow, the Countess ; who, at that 
date, had perhaps cast him oiT ' for ever ' — after the manner 
of capricious ladies — several times during a single court- 
ship. 



NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 203 

Chap. XVII. Sir Roger and Party Spirit. 

Nos. 125 and 126. Wednesday, July 25th, and Thursday, 
26,1711. Both by Addison. 

Page 114. This worthy Knif^ht had occasion to enquire 
which loas the way to St. Anne's Lane. There were two St. 
Anne's lanes which might have cost Sir Eoger trouble to 
find ; one ' on the north side of St. ]Martin's-lG-Grand just 
within Aldersgate Street' (Stow) ; and the other — which it 
requires sharp eyes to find in Strype's map — turning out of 
Great Peter Street, Westminster. Mr. Peter Cunningham, 
in his admirable Hand Book for London, prefers supposing 
Sir Roger enquiring his way in Westminster. 

Page 115. Sir Roger generally closes his narrative with 
reflections on the Mischief that Parties do in the Country. 
There is scarcely a period when party spirit raged so fiercely 
as at the date of these numbers of the Spectator; for, although 
faction had long sheathed the sword, the tongue in coflfee- 
houses and the pen in pamphlets were never more bitterly or 
rancorously employed. Only a few months previously, the 
trial of Dr. Sachevrel and the ' bed-chamber cabal ' — of 
which Mrs. Masham was chief — had overturned the Godol- 
phin ministry ; and had brought in the Tories with Harley at 
their head, backed by a new and eminently Tory House of 
Commons, with Whiggery enough in the Upper House and 
in the camarilla, to keep the flames of party in full glow. 
So nearly were sides balanced in the House of Lords, that to 
carry the peace project, which ended in the treaty of 
Utrecht, Anne was afterwards obliged to make twelve new 



204 NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 

Tory Peers — a ' jury ' of such well packed Tories, that a 
Whig wit asked one of them if they intended to vote by their 
' foreman.' The Duchess of Somerset was still retained 
about the person of the Queen ; and counteracted, in part, 
the subtle Tory whisperings of Mrs. Masham into Anne's 
ear. The lucrative employments of the Duchess of Marlbo- 
rough were divided between these two favourites. The 
Duke was on the eve of being impeached for peculation, and 
his regiment had actually been transferred to Hill, Mrs. 
Masham's brother. The Whigs violently advocated the con- 
tinuance of a war which Marlborough's victories had made 
at once so profitable to his private fortune and so glorious 
to the nation. The Tories and the Queen strove equally 
for peace : nor did this contest suspend the Church contro- 
versy which Sachevrel's trial had brought to issue without 
deciding. 

These questions ranged the British Public into two ranks, 
under Whig and Tory banners ; and carried the battle into 
private life in the manner not less truthfully than humor- 
ously described in the text, and in various other chapters of 
the Spectator. Families were estranged and friendships 
broken up, especially amongst those who played prominent 
parts in the struggle — such as Swift on the Tory, and Addi- 
son and Steele on the Whig side. Yet it is gratifying to 
observe, that the softening influences of literature afforded a 
lingering link of union to these men even after they were in 
political opposition. Swift, the foremost party pamphleteer 
of his day, did not scruple to use his influence with Harley, 
in favour of ' Pastoral ' Philips, Congreve, and on one occa 



NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 205 

sion for Steele. On the day of publication of the paper 
which forms part of our present chapter, (Thursday, July 
26th, 1711), Swift, Addison, and Steele, dined together at 
young Jacob Tonson's, ' Mr. Addison and I talked as usual, 
and as if we had seen one another yesterday ; and Steele 
and I were very easy, though I wrote him a biting letter in 
answer to one of his, where he desired me to recommend a 
friend of his to the Lord Treasurer.' Again, under a later 
date, Swift writes to Stella, ' I met Pastoral Philips and Mr. 
Addison on the Mall to-day, and took a turn with them ; but 
they looked terribly dry and cold. A curse on party ! ' 

The bonds of other classes of society were more forcibly 
riven. The lower the grade the more inveterate the conten- 
tion : for, as Pope said about that time, ' There never was any 
party, faction, sect, or cabal whatsoever, in which the most 
ignorant were not the most violent ; for a bee is not a busier 
animal than a blockhead.' Even trade was tainted by the 
poison of party. The buying, in its dealings with the selling 
public, more generally enquired into the political principles 
of tradesmen, than into the excellence or defects of their 
wares. Inn-keepers as we find in the text were especially 
subjected to this rule, and their politics were known by the 
signs at their doors. Addison's ' Freeholder's ' introduction 
to the Tory fox hunter was commenced by the recommenda- 
tion of a host — ' A lusty fellow, that lives well, is at least 
three yards in the girt, and is the best Church of England 
man upon the road.' 

Not the least conspicuous pariizans were, alas, of the 
gentler sex ; for the chiefs of each faction were women, and 



206 NOTES AND ILLUSTRATION'S. 

their theatre of war the Queen's bed-chamber. The pelty 
expedients of each faction to distinguish itself in public from 
the other, are happily ridiculed in various parts of the Spec- 
tator. At the play Whig and Tory ladies sat at opposite 
sides of the house, and ' patched ' on opposite sides of their 
faces: — ' I must here take notice, that Rosalinda, a famous 
Whig partizan, has most unfortunately a very beautiful Mole 
on the Tory part of her forehead ; which being very conspic- 
uous, has occasioned many mistakes, and given an handle to 
her enemies to misrepresent her face, as though it had 
revolted from the Whig interest. But whatever this natural 
patch may seem to insinuate, it is well known that her no- 
tions of government are still the same. This unlucky Mole, 
however, has misled several coxcombs ; and like the hanging 
out of false colours, made some of thcra converse with Rosa- 
linda in what they thought the spirit of her party, when on 
a sudden she has given them an unexpected fire, that has 
sunk them all at once. If Rosalinda is unfortunate in her 
Mole, Nigranilla is as unhappy in a Pimple, which forces 
her, against her inclination, to patch on the Whig side ' 
No. 81. 

So angry were the Whig ladies with the Queen when she 
presented Prince Eugene with the jewelled sword, that they 
abstained in a body from appearing at Court on that occasion : 
— which being that of Her Majesty's birthday was evidence 
of unprecedented party rancour. 



NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 207 

Chap. XVIII. The Coverley Gipseys. 
No. 130. Monday, July 30th, nil. By Addison. 

Chap. XIX. A Summons to London. 

Spectator, No. 131. Tuesday, July 31st, 1711. By Ad- 
dison. 

Page 127. What theij here call a White Witch. Accord- 
ing to popular belief, there were three classes of Witches ; 
— White, Black, and Gray. The first helped, but could not 
hurt ; the second the reverse, and the third did both. White 
Spirits caused stolen goods to be restored ; they charmed 
away diseases, and did other beneficent acts ; neither did a 
little harmless mischief lie wholly out of their way : — 
Dryden says 

' At least as little honest as he could, 
And like White Witches mischievously good.' 

Chap. XX. The Journey from Covekley Hall. 

No. 13-2. Wednesday, August 1, 1711. By Steele. 

Page 130. As soon as v)e arrived at the Tnn, the Servant 
enquired of the Chamberlain what Company he had for the 
Coach ? The best possible illustration of this passage is 
Hogarth's print of the Inn yard. The landlady in her semi- 
circular glass case, or penthouse bar; the parting drams being 
imbibed by the coachman and by some of the leave-takers ; 
the sleepiness of the ostlers and porters, and the deliberation 



208 NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 

of the passengers show how a journey was then commenced. 
The enquiry made by the servant was usual. It was a par- 
donable curiosity in the Spectator to try and learn with whom 
he was to be jumbled over rugged roads for the three entire 
days which were consumed by a stage-coach in a single 
transit from Worcester to London. 

Although it was more than a half century later before any 
great advance in road-making took place, yet the dawn of 
improvement in carriages was just beginning to break. To 
the Spectator for June 24, 1711, is appended the following 
advertisement ; 

' Whereas Her Majesty has been graciously pleased lately 
to grant Letters Patent to Henry Mill, Gent, for the Sole Use 
and Benefit of making and vending certain Steel Springs by 
him invented for the Ease of Persons riding in Chaises, &c. 
They effectually prevent all Jolts on Kennels and Rugged 
Ways.- 

Page 131. The Captain's Half-Pike. The soldier's pike 
had been recently superseded by the socket bayonet. Non- 
commissioned officers however retained the halbert, and offi- 
cers their half-pike. The Duke of Monmouth is described 
at the battle of Sedgemoor as having rushed about on foot 
among his broken levies to encourage them ' pike in hand.' 

Page 134. Our Reckonings^ Apartments and Accommo- 
dation fell under Ephraim. This duty was rather onerous, 
on account of the number of stoppages on the road, the 
consequent multiplicity of reckonings, and the equal number 
of attempts at over-charge. It was the custom for the male 
to pay for the refreshments of the female passengers. This 



NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 209 

was often felt as a grievous tax, and was in some cases 
resisted. Thoresby, in recording in his diary a stage-coach 
journey from Wakefield to London in 1714, states that on the 
third day there was an accession of passengers, ' which, 
though Females, were more chargeable in Wine and Brandy 
than the former Part of the journey, wherein we had neither ; 
but the Next Day we gave them Leave to Treat Them- 
selves.' 

Page 134. The right toe had of taking Place, as going to 
London; of all Vehicles coming from thence. This rule of 
the road was occasioned by the bad condition of the public 
ways. On the best lines of communication ruts were so deep 
and obstructions so formidable that it was only in fine weather 
that the whole breadth of the road was available, for on each 
side was often a quagmire of mud. Seldom could two 
vehicles pass each other unless one of them stopped. Which 
that should be caused endless disputes, and not a few 
accidents. Some obstinate drivers preferred disputation, and 
even collision and broken wheels or broken bones, to ' pulling 
up' in deference to a rival Jehu. At such times the path 
was blocked up for hours, and when an accumulation of 
vehicles was the consequence, the end was a general fight 
amongst the carriers, carters, and coachmen. — Single combat 
also arose, from a like cause, among pedestrians in the streets 
to settle the important question of who should ' take the wall.' 
This was a real privilege when, in ordinary weather, the 
edge of the foot-path was heaped with mud ; and, on wet 
days, streams poured upon it from the eaves of the houses. 
14 



210 NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 



Chap. XXL Sir Roger in London. 

No. 269. Tuesday, January 8, 1712. By Addison. 

Page 136. He told me that his Master was come up to get 
a Sight of Prince Eugene. The Prince's mission to this 
country was no less popular than his victories — gained in 
association with Marlborough — had made his person. It 
was to urge the prosecution with Austria of the war against 
France in terms of the treaty of 1706, and to endeavour to 
restore to the Queen's favour his great ally the Duke, who 
had only four days before his arrival been dismissed witli 
disgrace from all his employments. ' Gratitude, esteem, the 
partnership in so many military operations,' we read in 
Prince Eugene's Autobiography, ' and pity for a person in 
disgrace, caused me to throw myself with emotion into 
Marlborough's arms.' 

Nothing could exceed the entlmsiastic reception with which 
Eugene was greeted ; and, an adroit illustration of the 
eagerness of the public to behold him, is the bringing Sir 
Roger up to London solely for that purpose, only two days 
after the Prince's appearance. ' The knight,' says the 
Spectator, ' made me promise to get him a stand in some con- 
venient place where he might have a full view of that extra- 
ordinary man.' This was in fact a necessity; for whenever 
the Prince ventured in the streets, he was beset by eager 
multitudes, from the evening of his arrival (5th January, 
1712) till his departure. 

While there was a chance of gaining over the illustrious 



NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 211 

Envoy, the Court party joined in the general homage, and 
on her birth-day Anne gave the Prince a jewelled sword, 
valued at £4,500. Then Swift, at first sight, ' did'nt think 
him an ugly faced fellow, but well enough ; and a good 
shape.* {Journal^ Jan. 13.) Eugene was not to be won ; 
and persisted in passing most of his time with Marlborough : 
whom Harley, the lord treasurer, had just stripped of his 
title of general. One day at dinner, while Harley was 
plying the Prince with flattery and depreciating Marlborough, 
he called Eugene the first General in Europe. ' If I am so,' 
said the Prince, ' 'tis to yoi^r lordship T am indebted for. that 
distinction ' Both by words and behaviour, therefore, Prince 
Eugene firmly adhered to ihe cause he had come over to 
advance, and he fell into utter disrepute with the Tory or 
peace party. Then it was that Swift, eager as the rest, got 
a second glimpse of the great man ; but the same pair of eyes 
jaundiced with party prejudice found him ' plaguy yellow and 
literally ugly besides.' {Journal^ Feb. 10.) 

Meanwhile the illustrious Envoy was the idol of the 
populace and of the whigs. He returned their idolatry by a 
pleasing affability while in public ; and by a variety of small 
but agreeable courtesies in private. Amongst these it must 
be noted that he stood sponsor to Steele's second son. The 
whig ladies professed to be in love with him, and returned a 
compliment often paid to themselves by making him their 
toast. In company, he had, according to Burnet, ' a most 
unaffected modesty, and does scarcely bear the acknowledge- 
ments that all the world pay him.' 

His popularity was gall to the Tories, who with a too- 



212 NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 

prevalent and mean revenge set about showering- libels upon 
him. On the 17th of March, Prince Eugene retired from 
this country : his disgust and disappointment slightly tem- 
pered by the kindness of the Queen ; v^^ho, at parting, gave 
him her portrait. 

A running fire of squibs and pamphlets was kept up against 
the Tories on account of their cringing reception, and spiteful 
dismissal of the illustrious visitor. One was advertised in 
No. 471 of the Spectator as ' Prince Eugene not the Man 
you took him for; or a Merry Tale of a Modern Hero.' 
Price 6c?. 

Page 137. ' I was no sooner come into Gray''s-Tnn Walks, 
but 1 heard my Friend upon the Terrace hemming twice or 
thrice to himself, for he loves to clear his Pipes in good Air.^ 
Gray's Inn Gardens formed for a long time a fashionable 
promenade. The chief entrance to them was Fulwood's 
Rents, now a pent-up retreat for squalid poverty ; yet, in Sir 
Roger's day, no place was better adapted for ' clearing his 
pipes in good air,' for scarcely a house intervened thence to 
Hampstead. A contemporary satirist (but who can scarcely 
be quoted without an apology) affords a graphic description of 
this promenade: — 'I found none but a parcel of Super- 
annuated Debauchees huddled up in Cloaks, Frieze Coats, 
and Wadded Gowns, to preserve their old Carcasses from the 
Sharpness of Hampstead Air ; creeping up and down in Pairs 
and Leashes no faster than the Hand of a Dial or a County 
Convict going to Execution : some talking of Law, some of 
Religion, and some of Politics. — After I had taken two or 
three Turns round, I sat myself down in the Upper Walk, 



NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 213 

where just before rae on a Stone Pedestal was fixed an old 
rusty Horizontal Dial with the Gnomon broke short off.'* 
Round this sundial, seats were arranged in a semi-circle. 

Gray's Inn Gardens were resorted to by less reputable 
characters than the beggar whom good Sir Roger scolded 
and relieved. Expert pickpockets and plausible ring-droppers 
found easy prey there on crowded days. In the plays of the 
period, Gray's Inn Gardens are frequently mentioned as a 
place of assignation for clandestine lovers. 

Page 139. The late Act of Parliament for securing the 
Church of England. The lOth Anne, Cap. 2. 'An Act 
for preserving the Protestant Religion by better securing the 
Church of England as by law established,' &c. It was 
knov^^n popularly as the act of ' Occasional Conformity.' 

Page 140. The Papers Procession. Each anniversary of 
Queen Elizabeth's accession (Nov. 17) was for many years 
celebrated by the citizens of London in a manner expressive 
of their detestation of the Church of Rome. A procession — 
at times sufficiently attractive for royal spectators — paraded 
the principal streets, the chief figure being an effigy of 

' The Pope, that Pagan full of pride,' 

well executed in wax and expensively adorned with robes 
and a tiara. He was accompanied by a train of cardinals 
and Jesuits ; and at his ear stood a buffoon in the likeness of 
a horned devil. After having been paraded through divers 
streets, His Holiness was exultingly burnt opposite to the 

* Ward's London Spy, vol. i. p. 384. 



214 NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 

Whig club near the Temple gate in Fleet Street. After the 
discovery of the Rye House plot, the Pope's procession was 
discontinued ; but was resuscitated on the acquittal of the 
seven bishops and dethronement of James II. Sacheverers 
trial had added a new interest to the ceremony ; and on the 
occasion referred to by Sir Roger, besides a popular dread of 
the Church being — from the listlessness of the Ministers and 
the machinations of the Pretender — in danger, there was a 
very general opposition to the peace with France, for which 
the Tories were intriguing. The party cry of ' No peace ' 
was shouted in the same breath with ' No popery.' 

The Whigs were determined, it was said, to give signifi- 
cance and force to these watchwords by getting up the 
anniversary show of 1711 with unprecedented splendour. 
No good Protestant, no honest hater of the French could 
refuse to subscribe his guinea for such an object ; and it was 
said upwards of a thousand pounds were collected f< r the 
effigies and their dresses and decorations alone; independent 
of a large fund for incidental expenses. The Pope, the 
Devil, and the Pretender were, it was reported, fashioned in 
the likeness of the obnoxious Cabinet Ministers. The pro- 
cession was to take place at night, and ' a thousand mob ' 
were, it was asserted, to be hired to carry flambeaux at a 
crown a-piece and as much beer and brandy as would inflame 
them for mischief. The pageant was to open with ' twenty- 
four bagpipes marching four and four, and playing the 
memorable tune of Lillibullero.' Presently was to come ' a 
figure representing Cardinal Gaulteri, (lately made by the 
Pretender protector of the English nation,) looking down on 



NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 215 

the ground in sorrowful posture ; ' his train supported by 
two missionaries from Rome, supposed to be now in England.' 
— ' Two pages throwing beads, bulls, pardons, and indul- 
gences.' — 'Two jack puddings sprinkling holy-water.' — 
* Twelve hautboys playing the " Greenwood tree." ' — Then 
were to succeed ' Six beadles with Protestant flails,' and 
after a variety of other satirical mummers the grand centre- 
piece was to show itself: — 'The Pope under a magnificent 
canopy, with a right silver fringe, accompanied by the Chev- 
alier St. George on the left and his councellor the Devil on 
his right.' The whole procession was to close with twenty 
streamers displaying this couplet wrought on each, 

* God bless Queen Anne, the nation's great defender. 
Keep out the French, the Pope, and the Pretender.' 

To be ready for this grand spectacle the figures were 
deposited at a house in Drury Lane, whence the procession 
was to march (' with proper reliefs of lights at several sta- 
tions ') to St. James's Square, thence through Pall Mall, the 
Strand, Drury Lane, and Holborn, to Bishopsgate Street, 
and return through St. Paul's Church Yard to the bonfire in 
Fleet Street. ' After proper ditties were sung, the Pretender 
was to have been committed to the flames, being first absolved 
by the Cardinal Gaulteri. After that the said Cardinal was 
to be absolved by the Pope and burnt. And then the devil 
was to jump into the flames with his holiness in his arms.'* 

According, however, to the Tories, who spread the most 

* From a folio half sheet published at the lime. 



216 NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 

exaggerated reports of these preparations, there were to have 
been certain accidents which were duly and deUberately con- 
trived beforehand by the conspirators. Besides the great 
conflagration of the Sovereign Pontiff, there was to have 
been several supplementary bonfires in the line of inarch, into 
which certain actors of the show were to fling a mock copy 
of the preliminary articles of peace. This was to be the 
signal for a general exclamation of ' No peace ! ' Horse 
messengers had also been engaged — so wrote the Cabinet 
scribes — to gallop into the crowd ' as if to break their necks, 
their hacks all foam ' to cry out ' the Queen is dead at Hamp- 
ton Court ! ' Lord Wharton and several noblemen of even 
higher rank were to disguise themselves as sailors, to mix 
with and incite the mob. But the grand stroke was to be 
dealt by the Duke of Marlborough. He was on his way from 
Flanders — covered, most inopportunely for his enemies, with 
the glory of one of his best achievements ; that of having 
passed the strongly fortified lines drawn by the French from 
Bouchain to Arras. On this famous eve the duke was to 
have made his entry through Aldgate, and there met with 
the cry of ' Victory, Bouchain, the Lines, no Peace ! ' 

But all this was harmless as compared with the threatened 
sequel. On the diabolical programme were said to be in- 
scribed certain houses that were to be burnt dow'n. That of 
the Commissioners of Accounts in Essex Street was to form 
the first pyre, because in it had been discovered and completed 
Marlborough's commissorial defalcations. The lord treasur- 
er's was to follow. Harley himself was to have been torn to 
pieces, as the Dutch pensionary De Witt had been. Indeed 



NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 217 

the entire city was only to have escaped destruction and 
rapine by a miracle. It is here that the Spectator himself 
comes upon the scene. ' The Spectator, who ought to be but 
a looker-on, was to have been an assistant ; that, seeing 
London in a flame, he might have opportunity to paint after 
the life, and remark the behaviour of the people in the ruin 
of their country ; so to have made a diverting Spectator.'' * 

These were the coarse excuses which the Tories put forth 
for spoiling the show. At midnight on the 16 -17th of 
Nov. a posse of Constables made forcible entry into the Drury 
Lane Temple of the waxen images, and by force of arms 
seized the Pope, the Pretender, the Cardinals, the Devil and 
all his works, a chariot to have been drawn by six of his 
imps, the canopies, the bagpipes, the bulls, the pardons, the 
Protestant flails, the streamers, — in short the entire para- 
phernalia. At one fell swoop the whole collection was 
carried off to the Cock pit at Whitehall, then the privy 
Council office. That the city apprentices should not be 
wholly deprived of their expected treat, fifteen of the group 
were exhibited to the public gratis. ' I saw to-day the 
Pope, the Devil, and the other figures of cardinals, &c., 
fifteen in all, which have made such a noise. I hear the 
owners of them are so impudent, that their design is to re- 
place them by law. The images are not worth forty pounds, 
so I stretched a little when I said a thousand. The Grub 

* A true relation of the several fuels and circumstances of the in- 
tended Riot and Tumult on Queen Elizabeth'' s birthday, (^c, by an 
' understrapper' of Swift. See his Journal, Nov. 26, 1711. 



218 NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 

Street account of that tumult is published. The Devil is not 
like Lord Treasurer ; they were all in your odd antic masks 
bought in common shops.' Thus wrote Swift to Stella; 
yet, to the public he either gave, or superintended an account 
of the affair which was simply a string of all the mendacious 
exaggerations then wilfully put about by his patrons. Such 
were the party tactics of Sir Roger's time. 

Page 141. Squire'' s Coffee House. In Fulwood's Rents, 
leading from Holborn into Gray's Inn Gardens as mentioned 
ante. It was much frequented by the Benchers and Students 
of Gray's Inn. Squire was ' a noted coffee-man,' who died 
in 1717. 



Chap. XXII. Sir Roger in Westminster Abbey. 

Spectator, No. 329. Tuesday, March 18th, 1712. By 
Addison. 

Page 142. He had been reading my paper upon Westminster 
Abbey. Spectator, No. 26. 

Page 143. He called for a Glass of the Widow Trueby^s 
Water. One of the innumerable ' strong waters ' drunk, it 
is said, (perhaps libellously,) chiefly by the fair sex as an 
exhilarant; the excuses being the cholic and ' the vapours.' 
Addison, who pretends in the text to find it unpalatable, is 
accused as having been a constant imbiber of the Widow's 
distillations. Indeed, Tyers goes so far as to say, on the 
authority of ' Tacitus ' Gordon, that Addison hastened his 
end by indulgence in them. Although an advertisement of 
these waters is not to be found in the Folio Spectator, yet the 



NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 219 

curious will see in it strong puffs of other potent spirits in 
disguise — thanks probably to the business connexions of Mr. 
Lillie, perfumer. A ' grateful electuary ' is recommended in 
No. 1 13 as having the power of raising the spirits, of curing 
loss of memory, and revivifying all the noble powers of the 
soul, — at the small charge of two and sixpence per bottle. 

Another chymical secret, in No. 120, promises to cure 
' the vapours in women, infallibly, in an instant.' Daffy's 
Elixir is advertised in No. 356. 

Page 143. The Sickness being cd Danizick. — The plague 
which raged there in 1709. ' Idleness which has long raged 
in the world, destroys more in every great town than the 
plague has done at Dantzick.' Taller, Nov. 22, 1709. 

Page 145. ^ Sir Cloudeshj Shovel! a very gallant Man. ^ 
This monument is in the south aisle of the choir. 

' Sir Cloudesly ShoveVs Monument has very often given me 
great Offence. Instead of the brave rough English Admiral, 
which was the distinguishing Character of that plain gallant 
Man, he is represented on his Tomb by the Figure of a 
Beau, dressed in a long Perriwig, and reposing himself upon 
Velvet Cushions under a Canopy of State. The Inscription 
is answerable to the Monument ; for insteaa of celebrating 
the many remarkable Actions he had performed in the ser- 
vice of his Country, it acquaints us only with the Manner of 
his Death, in which it was impossible for him to reap any 
Honour.' Spectator, No. 20. 

The Sculptor was F. Bird. Sir Cloudesly Shovel died in 
1707. 

Page 145. Dr, Bushy! a great Man — he whipped my 



220 NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 

Grandfather. Dr. Busby was head master of Westminster 
School for Fifty-five years, and had the credit of having fur- 
nished both the church and the state with a greater number 
of eminent scholars than any other pedagogue. At the Res- 
toration he was made a Prebendary of Westminster, and 
carried the sacred ampulla at the Coronation of Charles the 
second. He was eighty-nine years old when he died, in 
1695. His monument, sculptured by Bird, stands not far 
from that of Sir Cloudesly Shovel. 

Page 145. The Statesman Cecil upon his Knees. In the 
chapel of St. Nicholas. This tomb was erected by the great 
Lord Burleigh, in the reign of Queen Elizabeth, to the mem- 
ory of his wife Mildred and their daughter Anne, whose 
effigies lie under a carved arch. ' At the base of the monu- 
ment, within Corinthian columns, are kneeling figures of 
Sir Robert Cecil, their son, and three grand-daughters. The 
inscription is in Latin, very long and very tiresome.' Peter 
Cunningham'' s Westminster Abbey. 

Page 145. That Martyr to good Housewifry who died with 
the prick of a Needle. This is one of the 'hundred lies' 
which the attendant is said to have told Goldsmith's Citizen 
of the World 'without blushing.' The monument, in St. 
Edmund's Chapel, is that of Elizabeth, youngest daughter of 
Lord John Russel (temp. 1584). ' The figure is melanchol- 
ily inclining her Cheek to her Right Hand, and with the 
Fore-finger of her Left directing us to behold the Death's 
Head placed at her Feet.' (Keepe Monaf. Westm.) This 
alone is said to have originated an unwarrantable verdict of 
' died from the prick of a needle.' 



NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 221 

Page 146. The Stone was called Jacob'' s Pillar ['pilloio']. 
This is the stone or ' Marble fatal Chair' which Gathelus, 
son of Crecops, King of Athens, is said to have sent from 
Spain with his son when he invaded Ireland ; and which 
Fergus, son of Gyric, won there and conveyed to Cove. The 
ston3 was set into a chair in which the kings of Scotland 
were crowned, till Edward the First offered it, with other por- 
tions of the Scottish Regalia, at the shrine of Edward the 
Confessor as an evidence of his absolute conquest of Scot- 
land. A Leonine Couplet was cut in the stone which has 
been thus translated : 

' The Scots shall brook that Realm as native ground 
(If Weirds fail not) wherever this stone is found.' 

This prophecy was fulfilled, to the satisfaction of the foithful 
in prophecy, by the accession of James VI. to the English 
Crown. How it got the name of Jacob's pillow is difficult 
to trace. It is a piece of common rough Scotch sandstone ; 
and Sir Roger's question was extremely pertinent. — The 
other coronation chair was placed in the Abbey in the reign 
of William and Mary. 

Page 146. Sir Roger, in the next Place, laid his hand 
upon Edward the Third'' s Sword. This, ' The monumental 
sword that conquered France,' is placed with his shield near 
the Tomb of Edward, and which he caused to be carried 
before him in France. The sword is seven feet long, and 
weighs eighteen pounds. 

Page 147. The Figure of one of our English Kings with- 
out a Head. The effigy of Henry V. which was plated with 



222 NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 

silver except the head, and that was of solid metal. At the 
dissolution of the monasteries the figure was stripped of its 
plating, and the head stolen. 

Chap. XXIII. Sir Roger at the Play. 

Spectator, No. 335. Tuesday, March 25, 1712, By 
Addison. 

Page 148. He had a great mind to see the new Tragedy. 
This was the Distressed Mother by Ambrose, otherwise ' Pas- 
toral ' Philips : and, as it was advertised in the above num- 
ber of the Spectator to be performed for the sixth time. Sir 
Roger must be supposed to have witnessed its fifth perform- 
ance. The ' first night ' is thus announced in the Spectator 
and in the Daily Courant of 17th March, 1712. 

'By Desire of several Ladies of Quality; by Her Majes- 
ty's Company of Comedians : 

' At the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane, this present Monday, 
being 17th March, will be presented a new Tragedy called 

'THE DISTRESSED MOTHER, 
' (By Her Majesty's Command no person will be admitted 
behind the scenes.) 

* Pyrrhus, Mr. Booth. Andromache, Mrs. Oldfield. 

PhcEnix, Mr. Bowman. Cephisa, Mrs. Knight. 

Orestes, Mr. Powell. Hermione, Mrs. Porter. 

Pylades, Mr. Mills. Cleone, Mrs. Cox.' 

Addison had a strong friendship for Philips, and took 



NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 223 

extraordinary pains, first to get his friend's play upon the 
Stage, and next to make it succeed ; for, according to Spence 
he caused the house to be packed on the first night. No. 290 
of the Spectator opens with a puff preliminary : 

' The Players, who know I am very much their Friend, 
take all Opportunities to express a Gratitude to me for being 
so. They could not have a better Occasion of obliging me, 
than one which they lately took hold of. They desired my 
Friend Will. Honeycomb to bring me to the Reading of a 
new Tragedy, it is called TJie Distressed Mother. I must con- 
fess, tho' some Days are passed since I enjoyed that Entertain- 
ment, the Passions of the several Characters dwell strongly 
upon my Imagination ; and I congratulate the Age, that they 
are at last to see Truth and humane Life represented in the 
Incidents which concern Heroes and Heroines. The Stile of 
the Play is such as becomes those of the first Education, and 
the Sentiments worthy those of the highest Figure. It was 
a most exquisite Pleasure to me, to observe real Tears drop 
from the Eyes of those who had long made it their Profes- 
sion to dissemble Affliction : and the Player, who read, fre- 
quently threw down the Book till he had given Yent to the 
Humanity which rose in him at some irresistible Touches of 
the imagined Sorrow.' 

Whoever dips into this turgid translation of Racine's An- 
dromache will be much amused at the green-room grief it is 
said to have drawn forth. Like many a worse play, some of 
its success was occasioned by the Epilogue as delivered by 
Mrs. Oldfield. 'This was the most successful composition 



224 NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 

of the kind ever yet,' says Johnson, ' spoken on the English 
theatre. The three first nights it was recited twice ; and not 
only continued to be demanded through the run, as it is 
termed, of the play ; but whenever it is recalled to the stage 
where by peculiar fortune, though a copy from the French, it 
keeps its place, the Epilogue is still expected and still 
spoken.' Its reputed author was Budgell ; but when Addi- 
son was asked how such a silly fellow could write so well ? 
he replied, ' The Epilogue was quite another thing when I 
saw it first.' Tonson published the play; and when it was 
first printed, Addison's name appeared to the Epilogue ; but 
happening to come into the shop early in the morning when 
the copies were to be issued, he ordered the credit of it to be 
given to Budgell ' that it might add weight to the solicitation 
which he was then making for a place,' This story was told 
to Garrick by a member of the Tonson family. The pro- 
logue was by Steele. 

Page 148. The Committee — a good Church-of-England 
Play. This comedy, written by Sir Robert Howard, was 
popular so early as 1663. Pepys, in his diary of that year, 
under June 12 writes — 'To the Theatre Royal, and there 
saw The Committee^ a merry but indiflferent play ; only 
Lacy's part, an Irish Footman, is beyond imagination.' 
Posterity has not ratified Pepys's criticism as to the ' indif- 
ference ' of The Committee, for it kept possession of the 
stage in one form or another till very lately. The part of 
Teague was always the greatest favourite, and gave to the 
Comedy the second title of ' The Faithful Irishman.' After 



NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 225 

Lacy it was filled with most applause by Leigh, whom 
Charles the Second called ' his Comedian : ' Griffin and 
Bowman respectively succeeded to it, and then the sponsor of 
the well-known jest book, Joe Miller; of whom a mezzotint 
likeness as Teague is still extant. The Committee^ cut 
down to a farce, was till lately played under the title of 
Honest Thieves. 

Much of its earlier celebrity was due to the political 
allusions in which The Committee abounds — to its being, in 
the words of Sir Roger, ' a good Church-of-England Play.' 
Sir R. Howard wrote it to satirize, in the character of 
Obadiah, the proceedings of the Roundheads ; and at the 
faintest dawn of religious excitement its announcement in the 
play-bills was, even in Sir Roger's time, sure to attract 
large audiences. Some five-and-twenty years before, when 
James the Second attempted to inflict popery upon Oxford, 
an interpolation by Leigh — who was playing Teague in that 
city — caused an intense commotion. The head of University 
College, Walker, (whose first name was the same as that of 
the chief part in the play — Obadiah) had gone so far, in 
obedience to the wishes of the king, as to introduce popish 
rites, and to turn his college into a Catholic seminary. This 
brought upon him great indignation, a tremendous burst of 
which was vented after Leigh's exploit : — towards the end 
of the Comedy, Teague has to haul in Obadiah with a halter 
about liis neck, and to threaten to hang him for refusing to 
drink the king's health. ' Here,' says Colley Cibber, ' Leigh, 
to justify his purpose with a stronger provocation, put him- 
15 



226 NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 

self into a more than ordinary heat with his captive ; and, 
having heightened his master's curiosity to know what 
Obadiah had done to deserve such usage, Leigh, folding 
his arms with a ridiculous stare of astonishment, replied : 
"Upon my shoul, he has shange his religion!"' The 
allusion was caught up and ran around like wild fire ; the 
theatre was suddenly in an uproar of applause. The play 
was stopped. Some of the audience rushed from the theatre, 
in open riot, to revile Obadiah Walker under his own win- 
dows. Afterwards lampoons abounded, and satirical ballads 
were publickly sung ; the most popular of which began : — 

' Old Obadiah 
Sings Ave Maria.' 

This adventure was the first intimation the king received 
of the disaffection of his Oxford subjects to the popish pro- 
ceedings he had set on foot there. He caused Leigh to be 
severely reprimanded ; and, for fear of the worst, sent down 
a regiment of dragoons to keep the Protestant ' town and 
gown' in check. It is not impossible that Addison may 
have assisted in this riot ; for he had entered as a student 
at Queen's College about a year before it happened. 

Page 148. Would there not be some danger on coming 
home late, in case the Muhocks should be abroad? It had been 
for many previous years the favourite amusement of dissolute 
young men to form themselves into clubs and associations 
for the cowardly pleasure of fighting and sometimes maiming 
harmless pedestrians, and even defenceless women. They 



NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 2*27 

took various slang designations. At the Restoration they 
were Muns and Tityre-Tus ; then Hectors and Scourers ; * 
later still, Nickers (whose expensive delight it was to smash 
windows with showers of halfpence), Hawkabites, and lastly 
Mohocks. These last took their title from ' a sort of canni- 
bals in India who subsist by plundering and devouring all 
the nations about them.'f Nor was the designation inapt; 
for if there was one sort of brutality on which they prided 
themselves more than another, it was in tattooing ; or slash- 
ing people's faces with, as Gay wrote, ' new invented 
wounds.' Their other exploits were quite as savage as 
those of their predecessors, although they aimed at dashing 
their m'schief v^-ith wit and originality. They began the 
evening at their clubs, by drinking to excess in order to 
inflame what little courage they possessed. They then 
sallied forth sword in hand. Some enacted the part of 
'dancing masters,' by thrusting their rapiers between the 
legs of sober citizens, in such a fashion as to make them cut 
the most grotesque capers. The Hunt spoken of by Sir 
Roger was commenced by a ' view hallo ! ' and as soon as 
the savage pack had run down their victim, they surrounded 
him, to form a circle with the points of their swords. One 
gave him a puncture in the rear which naturally made him 



* 'Pish, this is Nothing. Why, I knew the Hectors, and liefore 
them the Muns and Tityre-Tus : they were Brave Fellows indeed. 
In those Days a Man could not go from the Rose Tavern to the 
Piazza once, but he must venture his life twice.' — The Scourers, by 
Shadicell. 

t Spectator, No. 324. 



228 NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 

wheel about, then came a prick from another, and so they 
kept him spinning like a top, till in their mercy they chose 
to let him go free. An adventure of this kind is narrated 
in No. 332 of the Spectator. Another savage diversion was 
thrusting women into barrels, and rolling them down Snow 
or Ludgate Hill : Gay sings 

' their Mischiefs done 



Wherefrom Snow Hill black steepy torrents run ; 
How Matrons hoop'd within a Hogshead's Womb 
Were tumbled furious thence ; the falling Tomb 
O'er the Stones thunders ; bounds from Side to Side : 
So Regulus to save his Country dy'd.' 

At the date of the present Spectator, the outrages of the 
Mohocks were so intolerable, that they became the subject 
of a Royal Proclamation, issued on the 18th March, just a 
week before Sir Roger's visit to Drury Lane. Swift, who 
was horribly afraid of them, mentions some of their villa- 
nies. He writes two days previously, that ' Two of the 
Mohocks caught a Maid of old Lady Winchelsea's at the 
Door of her House in the Park, with a Candle, and had 
just lighted out Somebody. They cut all her Face, and 
beat her without any Provocation.' 

The proclamation had little effect. On the very day after 
our party went to the play, we find Swift exclaiming, ' They 
go on still, and cut people's faces every night! but they 
shan't cut mine ; I like it better as it is.' 

Page 150. The same Sword that he made use of at the 
Battle of Steenkirk. This battle was remarkable in the 



NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 229 

annals of fashion, for giving the name to a modish neck-cloth. 
At the beginning of August, 1692, while William the Third 
was in Flanders at the head of the allies, he discovered an 
enemy's spy in his camp, and to facilitate a project of sur- 
prising the French, his majesty caused him to give his 
master false information. The king then set upon the enemy 
at day-break, while they were asleep, and routed tliem. The 
French generals however rallied, and formed their troops on 
favourable ground, turned the tables, and finally conquered. 
The allies were so crest-fallen and disunited by this defeat, 
that William broke up the Campaign and retired to Eng- 
land. The French M'cre as much elated. Their generals, 
amongst whom were the Prince de Conde and the Duke de 
Vendome, were received in Paris with acclamation, and the 
roads were lined with jubilants. The ■pftits maitres shared 
in the general exultation, and although at that time it was 
their pride to arrange their lace cravats with the utmost 
elaboration and care ; yet, when they heard of the disordered 
dress in which the generals appeared in the fight, from theiir 
haste to get into it, they suddenly changed the fashion, and 
wore a sort of lace neglige, which they called a ' Steinkirk.' 
The fashion soon extended to England, and for several years 
the ' Steinkirk ' was your fop's only wear. 

Chap. XXIV. Sir Roger at Vauxhall. 

No. 383, Tuesday, May 20, 1712. By Addison. 

Page 154. I had promised to go with him on the Water to 
IG 



230 NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 

Spring- Garden. Fox-hall or Vauxhall Gardens were a sub- 
stitute for Old Spring Gardens, Charing Cross, when the 
latter ceased to be a place of public entertainment, and began 
to be covered with private residences. The name was 
derived from a ' Spring' which supplied a jet, 'by a wheel 
which the gardener turns at a distance, through a number 
of little pipes.' {Hentzner's Travels.) The jet was con- 
cealed, and did not spurt forth until an unwary visitor trod 
on a particular spot, when there came a self-administered 
shower bath. This, with archery, bowls, a grove of ' war- 
bling birds,' a pleasant yard and a pond for bathing, furnished 
the amusements. ' Sometimes,' says Evelyn, ' they would 
have music, and sup on barges on the water.' 

At the Restoration, builders invaded Spring Gardens, and 
its name was transferred to Yauxhall Gardens, which formed 
part of the estate of Sir Samuel Morland, who had already 
(in 1667) built a large room there. Except the Spring, the 
amusements were nearly the same as in the old garden. The 
' close walks ' were an especial attraction for other reasons 
than the nightingales, which, in their proper season, warbled 
in the trees. ' The windings and turnings in the little wil- 
derness,' quoth Tom Brown, ' are so intricate, that the most 
experienced mothers have often lost themselves in looking 
for their daughters.' We hear little of Vauxhall from the 
year of Sir Roger's visit (1712) till 1732, when it was 
resuscitated by Mr. Jonathan Tyers : he termed it Ridotto al 
Fresco, collected an efficient orchestra, set up an organ, 
engaged Hogarth and Roubillac to decorate the great room 
with paintings and statuary, and issued silver season tickets 



NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 231 

at a guinea each. From his time, till about ten or fifteen 
years' since, Yauxhall retained its popularity. 

Page 157. A great deal of the like Thames ribaldry. 
The ' silent highway ' was peculiarly favourable for that 
interchange of wit and repartee, in which the lower orders, 
and even facetious people of quality, loved to indulge. Tay- 
lor, the water poet, Sw^ift, and Dr. Johnson, have bequeathed 
to us some of these smart sayings ; but they are too coarse 
for repetition. 

Chap. XXV. Will Honeycomb on Widows. 
No. 359. Tuesday, April 22nd, 1712. By Budgell. 

Chap. XXVL Sir Roger passeth away. 

Spectator, No. 517. Thursday, Oct. 23, 1712. By Addi- 
son. 

Page 164. To keep them no longer in suspense, Sir Rogek 
DE CovERLEY IS Dead. ' Mr. Addison was so fond of this 
character, that a little before he laid down the Spectator 
(foreseeing that some nimble gentleman would catch up his 
pen the moment he quitted it) he said to our intimate friend 
with a certain warmth in his expression, which he was not 
often guilty of, "I'll kill Sir Roger, that nobody else may 
murder him." ' The Bee, p. 26. 

On this Chalmers sensibly remarks that, ' the killing of 
Sir Roger has been sufficiently accounted for, without sup- 
posing that Addison despatched him in a fit of anger ; for 
the work was about to close, and it appeared necessary to 



232 NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 

close the club ; but whatever diiference of opinion there may 
be concerning- this circumstance, it is universally agreed that 
it produced a paper of transcendent excellence in all the 
graces of simplicity and pathos. There is not in our lan- 
guage any assumption of character more faithful than that of 
the honest butler ; nor a more irresistible stroke of nature 
than the circumstance of the book received by Sir Andrew 
Freeport. ' 

Budgell's story is another version of the reason Cervantes 
gave for killing his hero; para mi sola nacio Don Quixote, y 
yo para el. Shakespere's motive for the early demise of 
Mercutio in the tragedy of Romeo and Juliet has been 
accounted for by a similar fiction. 

Page 167. Captain Sentry, my Master^s Nephew, has 
taken possession of the Hall-House, and the ivhole Estate, 
The 544th Number of the Spectator (Nov. 24th, 1712) con- 
tains a letter from the new Esquire, in which he says, ' I 
cannot reflect upon his [Sir Roger's] character, but I am 
confirmed in the truth which I have, I think, heard spoken 
at the club ; to wit, That a Man of a warm and well-dis- 
posed Heait. with a very small Capacity, is highly superior 
in human Society to him who, with the greatest Talents, 
is cold and languid in his Affections. But, alas ! why do 
I make a difficulty in speaking of my worthy Ancestor's 
Failings 1 His little Absurdities and Incapacity for the Con- 
versation of the Politest Men are dead with him, and his 
greater Qualities are even now useful to him. I know not 
whether by naming those Disabilities, I do not enhance his 
Merit, since he has left behind him a Reputation in his 



NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS. 233 

Country wliich would be worth the pams of the wisest Man's 
whole Life to arrive at.' — 'I have continued all Sir Roger's 
servants, except such as it was a relief to dismiss unto little 
livings within my manour ; those who are in a list of the 
good Knight's own hand, to be taken care of by me, I have 
quartered upon such as have taken new leases of me, and 
added so many advantages during the lives of the persons so 
quartered, that it is the interest of those whom they are 
joined with, to cherish and befriend them on all occasions.' 



THE END. 



t^X 



CM, 




:mw' ■r-\ 









5\ 



--^^^ 



'^ ^^ 



< ' , „. ■* .\ 



o. ^ \/' 



o 0^ 



^^^*y / -^ ',% 



9 1 "\ 



^ ^ " « ^ "c 



\ \^ s ^ ' ' ^ >o 



-P 



.o 












.^ ,SJ-^' 






,\ 



-^' 






^ ^ " /- ^% 



<L. 












-P 



"oO 



A 






,\ ■ V 



u 



[I 



"oo^ 



.H -Ki 









^<r *^' * ^. '.1. : D^3cidified using the Bookkeeper process. 
\. _ - V;- \ Neutralizina anpnt- MannQoiiim r««;^» 






vO o. 



^'■ 



^oo 



o^l n. 



Neutralizing agent: l\/1agnesium Oxide 
Treatment Date: March 2009 

PreservationTechnologies 

A WORLD LEADER IN COLLECTIONS PRESERVATION 

111 Thomson Park Drive 
Cranberry Township, PA 16066 
(724)779-2111 



^\ 






^ .^\ 



7^ 



^^' 









v^r 



^^ 



/* •^^'^^ 






^ ' u ^ k'^ <'\ 



x.^' 












oo 



A 



'^ ■>:. c'^ ^' 












.-^^■ 



\ 









0- X 



V I 



7 ^r-- 



-A 



^^. 






, h 






.0 o^ 



v>^ 



> A- \V ,,, . <^^ * 



.V. <* 









•^oo^ 









_ <^ 



'-^, 



-i^ A 



.\\ 



vO o 















C- .v^ 



> * ,. "^^ * " ' ' 






aV -P. 






z V 






V 






,.^^' 





















A^' - 









,^V ./>. 



- ^ 



O Jj k 









-^ 



,VN^ 






.0^^ 



\', 






